The Misadventures of Kitty and Bobby
by FarSide0013
Summary: What do you get when two super powered teens go on a date in New York City? With the type of lives they live, lots of property damage.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: The following story can tie into my DPV series, but can also be a stand alone story for those not currently enjoying that tale.**

**For those who have been reading my DPV series: This takes place not long after RRR, but before Disassembled.**

**For those who have not been reading my DPV series: What's wrong with you? I mean, seriously, what's up with that? Anyways, this takes place a few months after Season 4 of X-Men: Evolution. Bobby is a full fledged X-Men now and he and Kitty have been dating just under a month.**

**Standard disclaimers apply. I own nothing, yadda yadda yadda, don't sue, blah blah blah, you shouldn't have stopped making Evolution.**

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**The Misadventures of Kitty and Bobby**

**1**

To most of the people walking through Central Park in the early afternoon, they saw a couple of teenagers in love. Some found that comforting or endearing, reliving memories of times when they had been with someone special like the teens were currently. Some found themselves jealous they didn't have what the two had. But there was no denying that they were happy just sitting on a park bench with each other. The boy, young man really, had short brown hair that had been blown out of place a bit by the wind. He wore a blue t-shirt with the word "Iceman" in block letters inside the Top Gun logo and a pair of khaki cargo pants. He had one arm around his girl, and the other was using a spoon to take bites of a cup of ice cream she was holding. The girl, young woman really, had straight brown hair cut into a bob with long bangs that framed her face, accentuating her brilliantly blue eyes. Her red blouse matched nicely with a pair of black jeans and black heeled boots. She was leaning into the crook formed by the boy's outstretched arm and was holding the ice cream between them so they could both eat. Passersby not only could sense the endearment radiating off both of them to see they were enjoying themselves, but also the smiles on their faces. The girl in particular was having trouble eating as she was currently laughing so much that she missed several times with her spoon and wound up wearing quite a lot of it on her face. The boy helped her by wiping some of it off with a napkin.

Not all the looks at the two were looks of shared happiness at the prospect of young love. Occasionally someone would recognize one or both of their faces from television and would sneer at the two mutants polluting the park. A few of them even would make rude remarks, but Bobby Drake and Kitty Pryde simply ignored them. Today was their day off from the troubles of being mutants fighting to protect a world that hated and feared them. Bobby's arm had finally healed after dislocating his shoulder in a recent battle, school was out for the weekend, all was quiet on the superhero front, and so he had taken his girlfriend via train to the Big Apple for a day not only of sightseeing and relaxation ("Well, as relaxed as you can get in New York," he had told her), but as a way to get away from the mob of mutants living in the Xavier Institute that prevented any sense of privacy. They had spent the morning after the hour long ride to the city visiting the Statue of Liberty, eating some lunch, and then just enjoying a nice walk through Central Park, holding hands without a care in the world, sharing stories from their lives, as Bobby was doing at that moment.

"And then," Bobby said, laughing along with Kitty, "Beast comes out of the Danger Room soaking wet, caked in flour and chicken feathers, and he says, he says 'I think you may have missed one of the instructions.'"

"Oh jeez, I have no idea what Logan would have done if we pulled that on him," she laughed. She tried to take another bite of the ice cream when the vision of a feathered Wolverine flashed into her mind, and a fresh stream of giggles hit her, resulting in more of the ice cream missing her mouth. It veered straight up and hit her in on the tip of her nose. Her eyes crossed for a second as she looked at it, then erupted in laughter again.

Bobby, still chuckling to himself, took another napkin from the large stack he had sitting on his lap and wiped her face yet again for her. He leaned forward and kissed her nose with a smile. "What did they put in the ice cream that made you laugh like this?"

She slapped his chest. "You're the one that keeps telling me stories of all the crap you pulled when you were a New Mutant." She leaned up and captured his lips with her own for a quick kiss. "I'm having a great time though. It's so nice to get out of Bayville for a little while, especially with everything that's gone on lately."

"Never a moment of peace, is there?"

"Nope. But not like you want it any. Three days without a fight with the Brotherhood or someone else and you get all mopey and bored."

"I'm most entertaining when I'm bored."

"And destructive. I swear, the Professor would throw you, Kurt and Alex out if he found out about half the things you guys have done in the last month alone."

"The prank war did get a _little_ out of hand."

"A little?"

"Okay, a lot. But don't forget, you were involved as well missy."

"Whatever," she said, ignoring him and returning to the ice cream.

As she polished off the rest of the ice cream, he checked his watch. "We have a few hours until the train leaves, what do you want to do?"

"Duh, museum. You promised you'd take me and we've put it off long enough. Though I admit, the ice cream distraction was good one."

"Hey, I want to go to the museum too, but there're plenty of other things to do in the city and I know you'd spend all day there."

"I know, it's cutting into valuable makeout time."

"Yeah, that's true. Wait, what?"

Kitty just laughed at the confused look on his face. "That's what Dani said. She said you'd want to keep me out of the museums because I'd be too distracted to kiss you." And then firmly kissed him.

She pulled away just as he began to wrap his arms around her waist. "Museum."

He sighed in mock frustration. "All right all ready. Which one do you want to go to?"

"There's one on ESU's campus that has an exhibit right now of their past experiments. So much cool stuff they've done in the last few years, we have to go see it!"

"Okay, ESU it is. My cousin Mary used to go there. Couldn't handle the big city though and moved back to the West Coast after her first year," he said as they stood. Kitty grabbed her tiny backpack from the bench and together they walked back to the edge of the park to catch a cab.

Other than it being the cleanest cab they had taken so far, the cab ride to the University was uneventful until they reached the side street leading to the campus, where traffic was at a standstill.

"Great," Bobby said, laying his head back to stare at the terrifyingly stained ceiling of the cab.

"We're actually not that far, let's just get out and walk," Kitty said as she pushed open the door and left the cab. Bobby gave the driver some money and slipped out through the open door. He could hear some sort of alarm in the distance as they walked down the street. To their right was the campus itself. Even on a weekend there was a constant flow of students moving from one building to another, while others simply lounged in the grassy courtyards they could see at the end of the sidewalks leading into the school's interior.

"So which building are we looking for?"

Kitty reached into her bag and pulled out a map of the campus that she had downloaded from the Internet. It took her a moment of turning in, glancing around at street signs until she pointed at the building up the street and said, "I think that's the back of the building we need, the entrance should be over on the other side."

"I've always wanted to go to ESU. Their science program is on par with MIT, and Beast said that in the last few years they've had better results in a lot of different fields," Kitty babbled as they made their way down the street. "What about you?"

"Experimental science isn't for me. I'm decent with a computer though, I could do something with that. But I always figured I'd stay in Bayville, especially since I was bumped up to the A-Squad. Haven't you ever thought of staying?"

"Sure, but I don't know if I want my life to always be about the X-Men. Yeah, I've come to like it, but there's a lot out there I want to experience, and some of that's normal stuff."

She looked over and saw what she had come to know as the "Bobby is upset but he's not going to show it no matter what face." She squeezed his hand and gave him a reassuring smile. "That's still a year away for me. Plus, if I were to come here, you could come and visit me all the time. ESU is only an hour away."

He couldn't help but smile the "Bobby is scheming" smile, as she thought of it. "It'd be even quicker if I take the jet for a joyride."

"Yes it would be," she laughed.

Somewhere in the distance they could hear sirens heading somewhere in this direction. "Wonder what's going on?" Bobby said, craning his neck around for some kind of trouble.

"It's New York. There's always a siren going," she answered.

"And you want to live here?"

"It's exciting?" she said with a shrug.

"Yeah, I guess so. Maybe there's some high speed chase going on we can stop. That could be exciting."

"Maybe, but remember the Professor told us to stay out of trouble."

"Actually, he told you to keep me out of trouble," Bobby said with a smirk, "but come on Kitty, we're going to a museum that's showing off models of old science experiments some college kids did. What sort of trouble are we going to get into?"

"Great, now there's going to be trouble. There's always trouble when you open your big mouth like that!"

"Come on, look at this traffic, there's no high speed anything around here."

They were nearly at the edge of the museum when the wall facing the street exploded outwards, showering the street in a rain of brick and mortar that smashed into car windshields and the side of the neighboring buildings. Bobby and Kitty dropped to the ground to avoid the wall remnants that sailed in their direction, Kitty instinctively phasing both of them.

"Bobby Drake! This is all your fault!" she yelled at him over the sound of smashing glass and the occasional car alarm.

He glanced up to see that the chunks of the building had stopped flying, so he pulled himself off the ground and helped Kitty up. "Man that was cliché even for us. Are you okay?" he asked, looking her over.

"I'm okay. Sometimes I really love my powers."

"Me too," he said, looking towards the smoking hole in the side of the nearby building. "Guess the Professor can't blame us if trouble lands in our laps. Let's see if we can help—"

He was cut off as a long, three pronged metal claw grabbed onto the remains of the wall from inside the building. Even over the car alarms he could hear a strange, almost hissing noise and the crunch of brick as the claw clamped down. A second claw came out of the hole and landed on the sidewalk outside. It too clamped down and he could see the metal digging into the concrete. The claw was attached to a metal tentacle that flexed as it pulled back on the anchored grip. The next to immerge from the hole was a man in a brown trench coat. His disheveled hair fell down across his eyes, which were covered by thick, black glasses. But what Bobby and Kitty noticed most was that his booted feet were a meter of the ground. He was being propped up by the two metal tentacles, one end of each digging into the brick and cement, the other seemingly protruding from his back. A second pair of tentacles was twisting hypnotically in the air above him, like two cobras rising from the grass, looking for something to strike.

The man turned back to the hole, them and began to yell in a slight accent. "Get moving Lizard, there is no time to waste!"

A second figure came from the damaged building, this one quickly darting out and glancing around the street. It was the cross of a man and a crocodile, a green scaled monster with a toothy snout, predatory yellow eyes, clawed hands and feet and a long, swishing tail, stuffed into the tattered remains of a pair of slacks and a white lab coat. In its arms it carried a strange metal device that looked to be a gun of some sort, the type mounded to a turret.

The few students on the street that were peaking their heads out from cover took one look at the two standing amidst the rubble and ran. Those in the backed up cars had already taken off after the blast, leaving behind their cars. Kitty and Bobby had stood some distance a way. The two hadn't noticed the teens yet.

The wail of the police sirens was louder now, and they could see one car rounding the corner and screeching to a halt before it crashed into the line of cars abandoned after the building exploded. The two officers threw their doors open, using them as cover as they drew their guns. "Freeze! Put your hands in the air and step away from the building!" one of the police yelled through the car's loudspeaker.

"They never learn," the man with the metal arms muttered. The two tentacles not supporting him reached out and latched onto a car that was still idling in front of him. They pulled upwards, lifting the sedan launching it down the street towards the police. It blocked several of the shots fired by the cops before the officers scrambled for cover away from their car. The flying car smashed into the hood of the police cruiser, sending both cars tumbling backwards before something on the thrown vehicle sent out sparks and exploded. The mutants, though some distance from the explosion, ducked behind one of the cars on their end of the street.

"I get the impression that those two are probably bad guys," Bobby muttered to Kitty.

"Ya think? We should do something before someone gets hurt," Kitty said, tightening the straps on her small backpack so she wouldn't lose it.

"What happened to staying out of trouble?"

"Please, you're loving this already."

"Just a little bit. I'll take the lizard guy."

She nodded. "Let's see if those arms still work when I phase through them."

The two teens stood up from their place of cover and ran down the street towards the two villains. The one with the tentacles caught sight of them and turned to face them. "What is this? Mere children come to confront me? There is only one prepubescent menace I care about and neither of you are him." He turned back towards the end of the street, throwing another car at a second police car that was attempting to maneuver around the flaming wreckage before beginning to move towards an alley across the street.

"How about you stop throwing cars and let the nice policemen take you away," Kitty said, arms crossed over her chest.

"Before we make you sorry you ever woke up this morning," Bobby added with a smirk. He could hear Logan in his head yelling at him for standing around and bantering with these two, but between Kitty's ability to avoid their attacks, and his ice powers against a cold-blooded enemy, he was feeling pretty confident.

Stopping in mid stride, the tentacled man turned back towards them slowly. "Do you know who I am you insignificant bug?"

"Can't say that we do," Bobby said.

The man's voiced raised in anger, his tentacles waving in agitation. "I am Dr. Otto Octavius, one of the planet's greatest minds! You, children who think they are safe because of their age, do not have the slightest inclination of what I am capable. My metallic beauties will break your bones while partner in this crime devours your flesh for your insolence!"

The Lizard opened his mouth and let out a hiss. "Letssss kill them and get out of here!" With one arm slinging the gun device over his shoulder, Lizard made a lunge for Bobby with an outstretched arm and razor sharp teeth bared. Octavius's two upper arms came thundering down like hammers at Kitty.

Dodging to his right, Bobby iced his body up as the claws of the monster tore through the air where Bobby's head once stood. Putting his hands together he focused on freezing the air in front of him and sending a beam of ice into the white coated creature. The force of the blast sent it crashing back into the remnants of the museum wall. It rolled once before pulling itself onto three legs, the fourth cradling the stolen science equipment close to its chest. It scurried towards Bobby again, and was again met with an ice blast that drove it back.

Rather than dodging Octavius's attack, Kitty merely phased and allowed the two metal limbs pass right through her. She grinned at him as he attempted to move the limbs and a look of terror and frustration crossed his face. She stepped forward through the angled arms and delivered a punch to his sternum, unphasing her hand at the moment of contact. He folded forward and she raised her other arm, her elbow making contact with his chin. Moving around his body to sweep out his legs, she was caught off guard as one of the disabled arms suddenly twisted towards her and wrapped around her waist. She was quickly lifted almost four feet of the ground before she phased through the tentacle and landed in a crouch on the ground. The tentacle remained frozen in the air as if it was still holding her for a moment before it began to twitch and resumed moving.

Octavius coughed and held his stomach as two of his tentacles lifted him off the ground and walked him several feet back away from Kitty. "Mutants," he coughed. "I find your powers quite fascinating girl," he said, his voice becoming stronger again as he regained his breath. "No doubt you disrupt electrical currents as you pass through objects, a truly remarkable specimen to study, even for one who is not a geneticist. But how unfortunate for you that my creations are designed to withstand such power failures."

"Still can't hit me," Kitty said, stepping into a fighting stance and preparing for his next attack.

"As I said before, you are nothing to me. I have come for the Neogenic Recombinator and you cannot stop me." He smirked at her. "Besides, I don't need to hit you."

A tentacle shot out towards Bobby, who was putting the finishing touches on encasing the Lizard's lower body in ice. "Duck Bobby!" Kitty yelled out at him, and he dropped to the ground instantly, glancing upwards to see the metal arm shoot through where he just was and hit the trapped Lizard in the face. The impact knocked the creature back, shattering the ice and sprawling the green scaled man out on the ground.

Bobby's relief from narrowly missing the attack ended abruptly as the second of the Doctor's left-hand tentacles snaked its way around Bobby's ankle and lifted him up off the ground. Bobby attempted to freeze Octavius but his shot was blocked by a second tentacle, which undulated and cracked the ice that formed around it. A third tentacle came from underneath him and grabbed his head in its metal claw. "I suggest you hold still or you might get hurt," Bobby heard the Doctor say. "Same goes for you girl. Lizard, grab the Recombinator and let us leave before the police get through our little barricade. We must—aahh!"

Kitty had watched as a tiny pale ball soared through the air and hit Otto in the face. It exploded on impact, becoming a mass of gooey substance that covered his glasses and cutting off his vision. Seeing her chance, she ran and leapt at Bobby, phasing them both through the metal arms and into the ground on the far side. Pulling themselves out, Kitty unphased them as they settled on ground level again, and she watched as the Doc tried to pull the sticky mess off his face. She wondered what it was, or where it could have come from when she heard it, a young but confident voice ringing out over the expletives of the tentacled man and the groaning hisses of the dazed Lizard.

"Sorry I'm late folks. I had Taco Bell for lunch!"

Kitty and Bobby both looked over as a figure landed in a perch on a mailbox that had been twisted and bent in the carnage. He wore a red and blue skintight costume with spider webs etched on in black, a black spider sitting in the center of the web on his chest. He wore a full, face covering red mask that continued the web pattern, except for the extremely large, black rimmed white eyes.

"Oh my god, it's Spider-Man!" Kitty said, unable to mask the joy in her voice at actually seeing the elusive hero.

"That's right, fair damsel in distress. It is I, you're friendly neighborhood Spider—holy crap you're made of ice!" It looked as if the already large eyes of the mask opened wider with the shocked reaction of Spider-Man, whose head pulled back as he pointed a long finger at Bobby.

"Uh, so?" Bobby said, shrugging his shoulders. "That guys a lizard, you're in pajamas, that guy has four metal arms."

"Yeah, but dude, that's stuff I see every day. You're made of ice!"

The conversation was cut short as Octavius yelled louder than the other two. "Spider-Man! You will rue this day. I shall break you where all others have failed!"

"You realize that you've failed just as many times, if not more when you think about it, than the others, right Ock?"

Spider-Man began to move seemingly before his enemy did. Just as one of the tentacles began to dart out towards the sound of his voice, he leapt high into the air, arching over the attack in a half flip. He was upside down as the tentacle reached where he had been crouching. Kitty and Bobby watched in awe as Spider-Man stretched both his arms forward and dual streams of the pale substance shot out of his wrists. It impacted with the extended tentacle and pushed it downward against the mailbox, spreading out like a web and binding the metal to the top of the mailbox. Spidey continued to soar through the air, pulling his arms in to his chest to avoid another tentacle, tucking his legs and rolling in the air to dodge a third attack, and ended by kicking downwards on Ock's head. Flipping again as he pushed off the now stumbling doctor, he twisted his body in the air to land on the ground with a flourish, crouching low to the ground and facing Ock.

Octavius caught his balance by thrusting a tentacle forward into the ground, then spun to face the wall crawler. He had managed to remove some of the webbing from his face, and sneered when he saw the masked hero. The arm that was webbed to the mailbox flexed, ripping the box from its moorings. Another grabbed the box and pulled, tearing through the webbings that attached it to the first arm. It then arced forward and threw the mailbox like a discus at Spider-Man, who flipped backwards, sticking to the damaged wall of the museum as the mailbox smashed through the bricks below him.

The entire exchange, from Spidey's first dodge from atop the mailbox to now had taken only a few moments, a terrifying dance at dizzying speeds. Ock again lunged with his tentacles at Spider-Man, destroying what was left of the brick museum wall as the agile man dodged and ducked the whirling metal limbs.

"Wow," was all Kitty said as she watched the two spar, Spider-Man moving nimbly through the limbs, landing punches here and there before retreating back.

"Stop drooling," Bobby said with a smirk in his voice, his face, if she had bothered to look, recognizable to Kitty as a clear example of the "Bobby is upset but he's not going to show it no matter what face."

"I'm not drooling, just look at the way he moves. Like he knows what's coming."

"We should help him."

"No!" Kitty said, putting her arm out to stop Bobby. "He knows what he's doing; we'd just get in the way."

"We can't just do nothing. It's a super-villain!"

"I gotta thank you Doc, this workout program you designed is doing wonders for my figure," Spider-Man said as he jumped over one lower sweeping tentacle and twisted his upper body limbo style under a car door that had been ripped off and thrown at him. Before he touched the ground again he sent a rope of webbing at the spot where one tentacle connected with Octavius's back. But as soon as the web made contact, Ock twisted his body, jerking hard on the line still being held by Spider-Man and pulling the hero into a pair of waiting tentacles.

Grabbing his dazed opponent, Doc Ock wrapped the two tentacles around Spidey and lifted him off the ground to eye level as they began to squeeze the life out the wall crawler. "You cannot defeat me Spider-Man. Your powers alone are not enough to stop Dr. Otto Octavius!"

"Too bad you forgot about us!" Bobby said from behind Otto, who turned his head just in time to see Iceman hit him with a beam of ice in the lower back, right where the four tentacles were fused onto his body. He cried out as the cold penetrated through the metal to his skin, the limbs hold Spider-Man loosing enough to let the masked teen slip from Octavius's grasp. Frost, followed by fully formed ice appeared around the joints, spreading down each tentacle and parts of his back. The weight of the added ice caused him to drop to his knees, immobilizing him.

Kitty rushed over and helped up the rising Spidey. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah, I'll be fine, little winded," he said, holding his ribs. He looked down at her, and she just smiled back up at him. "Can I help you?"

"Huh?" she said airily.

"You're staring."

"Huh? Oh, sorry! It's just, like, you're Spider-Man, the real Spider-Man. And you're totally real, and not made up like some people say and I'm babbling, aren't I?"

Under his mask he couldn't help but smile. "It's okay, you're cute when you're babbling."

He turned back to look at Ock, whose tentacles were now encased in a solid block of ice. The doctor tried to walk forward towards them, but the weight of the ice was too much and he only managed to drag the mass a few inches before collapsing back to the ground. Just to be safe, Spidey began to web up Ock's regular arms and legs as well.

"This is not the end of this Spider-Man! I will free myself from this icy prison and destroy you once and for all! And you!" he said, turning his head as much as he could towards Bobby. "You, mutant, have made a terrible enemy this day! There is no where in this world that you can hide from the wrath of Doctor Octopus! I will have my remmph!"

Octavius's rantings were cut short by a wad of webbing covering his mouth.

"Sorry about that, he doesn't always know when to shut up." Spidey turned to look at the two of them when something dawned on him. "Hey, wait a minute, I know you two. I saw you on television. You were fighting that big robot and then that Juggernaut guy at that damn."

"Yeah, that was us," Kitty answered. "I'm Kitty Pryde, this is Bobby Drake. We're X-Men."

"Nice to meet you. You guys were awesome in those fights. And thanks for your help with these two," he said, waving his hand at the tied up Doc Ock and the still knocked out Lizard. "Seems all my rogues were out today, Rhino was tearing up some warehouses down on the river and I still can't get the smell of fish out of my nostrils. I have no idea why he was tearing up fish canneries." He cocked his head to the side and Kitty and Bobby heard the sirens as well. "Well, looks the like the cops have decided to find out what happened to their missing cars, and since I never know if it's going to be the ones that like to take shots at me, I'm heading out. Thanks again!"

"Wait," Kitty said. "Can't we, like, you know, hang out or something? It's not every day we meet, well, someone like you. You must have all sorts of cool stories and, um, stuff."

"Come on Kitty, I'm sure the guy has better things to do than hang out with us," Bobby said, trying very hard to hide the annoyance he found in the looks Kitty was given the masked man.

"Well," answered Spidey, "three costumed villains in one day is pretty rare, I doubt there would be a fourth. And since I've only met one other super powered teen, which isn't enough to start a club and buy those secret decoder rings yet, why not?" He shot a web line to the top of a nearby building. "Grab on tight, we can crash on that roof for a little while." They held onto his shoulders, Bobby only after Kitty gave him a pleading look, and with a push of his legs and a pull of the web, he had them on the roof in no time.

They sat down against a wall, Spidey sitting literally on the roof access doorway. Bobby, who had unfrozen himself at this point, wrapped an arm around Kitty's shoulder as she leaned into his side.

"So what brings you two lovebirds to New York? Don't you live at some top secret mutant paramilitary commando base in Bayville?"

"Just down to see the city for the day," Kitty said. "And the institute is a school, a place for mutants to learn how to control their powers and integrate into society without problems."

"But you guys have jets and laser cannons and underground training facilities and a budget that's clearly a few gazillion dollars more than mine."

"We learn to use our powers for good, and the whole X-Men / hero stuff helps show not all mutants are bad guys," Bobby said. "I'm surprised the Professor never picked you up on Cerebro and contacted you, even just to meet you. He likes to keep tabs on all the mutants he finds."

"Oh, that's why, I'm not a mutant."

"What?" Kitty asked with a shocked look on her face. "Then how did you get your powers?"

"Sort of a long story," he said, shrugging a bit. "See, I was—"

Gunshots rang out bellow them and all three of them jumped to their feet. Rushing to the edge of the building they could see the Lizard back on his feet, the Neogentic Recombinator in his left hand, his right lashing out at police in one direction while his tail knocked down a few others. He crouched down and grabbed one officer not lucky enough to get out of the way in time. Lifting him up off the ground the Lizard threw the cop at a group farther back and then quickly darted off, heading down the alley on the other side of the building. The teens ran along the roof following him from above. He ran down the alley and through the busy traffic on the other side, weaving through and over a few of the cars, ducking into the next alley.

"Crap, he's getting away!" Spider-Man yelled, diving off the building and shooting a line across the street. He swung forward, letting go just as he started moving back up in his arch and sent out another webline.

"We can't let Lizard hurt anyone else, come on!" Bobby said. He grabbed Kitty hand and they jumped off the building too, landing on a bridge of ice Bobby had formed in the air and attacked to the side of the buildings. With one hand forward and the other holding Kitty's, they slid after Spider-Man. For five blocks they weaved in and out of buildings until Bobby saw Spidey drop down and land on the ground in an alley. Creating a slope in the slide, they met him on the ground.

"He went into the sewers. Always the sewer with this guy and me without my sewer suit," Spidey said as they joined him next to an open manhole. "You two up for this?"

They looked at each other, than both nodded at him. "Let's take this guy out. Whatever that Neogermanic Recombobulator is, we can't let him get away with it," Bobby said.

"Neogenic Recombinator?" Spidey exclaimed. "Oh crap, I didn't know he took that! Sewers and crazy genetic disruptors, this is just turning out to be the most wonderful day in the history of the universe! why did I even bother getting out of bed today?" he continued to mutter as he crawled head first into the manhole.

"Okay, that's a little creepy," Bobby said as the other man went upside down into the sewers.

"He's so cool," Kitty said as she watched Spider-Man. "We're actually on an adventure with _the_ Spider-Man. Dani's never going to believe me! And he's got such a nice butt."

"Hi. I'm Bobby, your boyfriend. Forget about me?" he said with an exasperated look on his face. "Octopuses, lizards, sewers and other guy's butts. Not what I expected this date to turn into," he said, turning back to the hole in the alley.

With a giggle and a wink, Kitty slapped his backside. "Don't worry, you've got a nice butt too."

"Damn right I do. Now let's go be heroes."

She laughed again and kissed his cheek. She dropped into the hole, making her way down the ladder with Bobby following close behind.


	2. Chapter 2

**2**

Two weeks ago, as he sat outside nursing the tail end of an arm injury that prevented him from participating in the raging game of MutantBall he was watching, Bobby Drake had dreamed up what he hoped to be a perfect day in New York City for him and his new girlfriend Kitty Pryde. She had never been to the city, and he had only been once with his family several years before. It was a miracle that he was able to convince the adults to allow them to go (he suspected it was a way to make up for some of what happened during his promotion), and he wanted to make sure that he and Kitty had a day to remember. It certainly had turned out that way, though not through any planning on Bobby's part. After all, of the tourist spots he had come up with, traveling through the sewer system chasing after a giant Lizard along side a superhero currently perched on the ceiling was not on the list of must see activities. In fact, the idea had never even crossed his mind.

He was torn about this unexpected situation. On one hand, an adventure with a dangerous enemy waiting at the end of it beat sitting in a museum long after he had lost interest in the exhibits any day. He was doing what he liked best, being a hero, protecting the innocent, righting the wrongs and stopping the bad guys. Better than that, this was a genuine team-up, straight out of the comic books or his Saturday morning cartoons. The X-Men meet the Amazing Spider-Man.

On the other hand, his girlfriend was acting pretty weird around their masked partner, and he didn't like it at all. Bobby knew she had moments of being obsessed with Spider-Man, even when most news about the hero was rare outside of New York City. There was an Internet following of the hero she kept up with, and her computer's wallpaper was currently a photo a freelance photographer for the Daily Bugle had taken of the hero swinging through the city. It always seemed innocent enough, a left over of Kitty's teeny-bopper phase. And Bobby could hardly complain when his own wallpaper was one of Scarlett Johansson. Was this then just a case of awe at meeting her favorite celebrity, or more?

He really hoped he was just jumping at shadows.

They had stepped off the ladder into dim of the sewer, irregular patches of sunlight penetrating the darkness from manhole covers and the occasional grate. It was a long, straight tunnel that curved into an arch above their heads, with a carved out area about five yards wide at the bottom where a shallow pool of murky water sat. Raised walkways on either side of the gap were connected with the occasional metal walkway crisscrossing over the water below. The tube was broken only by turns to other tunnels and carved out niches where ladders led up to manholes, or where storm drains connected to dump water and garbage washed down from the streets above. It was relatively dry, though a sense of dampness seemed to hang in the air, among other things.

"Ugh, why can't I phase through smell?" Kitty said as she took her first real breath of the stale air.

"Not much worse than that first taxi," Bobby said.

"Wait, you took multiple taxis in New York?" Spidey asked, looking down at them.

"Yeah, so?"

"I'm impressed. You're braver than you look. And the sewers aren't too bad right now. I've been down here in the rainy season, this is absolutely pleasant, and relatively clean I might add," added Spidey, and he began to crawl briskly along the ceiling down the tunnel.

"Says the guy who doesn't have to walk through whatever this is on the ground," Bobby muttered, stepping around a pile of green slime that flowed down the walkway into the water below.

Smacking Bobby in the arm as she passed, Kitty walked around the slime and after the hero. She was trying to do her best to ignore her environment, which wasn't that hard when she focused on Spider-Man instead. "Should we try to be quiet or something, in case he tries to ambush us?"

Spidey had stopped at an intersection as was looking carefully at each tunnel before deciding on continuing down the one they were in. "Huh? Ambush? No, don't worry, I'll know if we're in trouble."

"How? Are you psychic?" Kitty asked.

"Hmm, maybe it could be some low grade form of telepathy, I don't really know. But anyways, I have this spider-sense that will let me know."

"Spider-sense? What's next, a can of Spider-Shark-Repellant?" Bobby quipped.

Spider-Man ignored that last bit. "It's like a danger sense. I get this feeling, like a brain freeze or all the hairs on the back of my neck standing up, and I know something's wrong. Usually I'm able to react in time."

"Usually?" Bobby asked.

"Sometimes I'm not fast enough and get punched in the face."

"Very reassuring," Bobby mumbled.

"What else can you do?" Kitty asked in awe. "And where did you get your powers if you aren't a mutant?"

"Well obviously I can stick to things. On top of that and the spider-sense, I've been able to figure out I have roughly the proportional strength, speed and agility of a spider. Keen fashion sense figures into that equation somewhere too, but the math is a bit tricky."

"What about that gooey stuff?"

"Webs," he said, shooting a string of web out of his right wrist. It hit the curve of the wall and spread out, forming a web like pattern as it stretched out.

"Yeah, you can make webs too?"

"Not quite," he said as he stopped his crawl along the ceiling and sent out another webline, this time to the top of sewer tunnel. Grabbing the line with his hands and feet, he lowered down to be eye level with Kitty, though hanging upside down. Keeping a grip by what looked to be only his feet pressed together with the line in between them, he took off one of his gloves to reveal his pale white hand with a metal device attached to his wrist with a angled beam extending to the center of his palm, a tiny red spot at the end of it.

"This is a web shooter. It uses a compound fluid derived from a prototype adhesive formula I found in some old notes of my dad. The stuff is strong enough to stick on Teflon and biodegrades in about an hour, so I'm not leaving it all over the city (like that rat Jameson keeps claiming I'm doing)," he added mostly to himself.

"Wait, you built this?" Kitty asked, holding his wrist and examining the device while behind her Bobby crossed his arms and glared at them.

"Uh, yeah," he said, the confidence he normally displayed while wearing the mask slipping a bit as the beautiful young girl examined his work.

"Adjustable threaded nozzle, rotating compression chambers, this triggering mechanism looks crazy complex," she said as she leaned in to take a closer look.

"Well, it has to be, I don't want it shooting off accidentally when making punching the bad guys or waving to my adoring public. It takes certain fingers tapping on the palm sensor here and the wrist in a certain position to fire."

Bobby hated to admit how impressed he was with the web shooting device the kid had made, it reminded him of something Forge might come up with, except whoever was under the mask actually made it work. But Kitty was way too close at this point. Wrapping an arm around her and looking over her shoulder, he glanced at the device. "That is pretty cool. But shouldn't we be more worried about finding the Lizard?"

"Yeah, you're right," Spidey said, pulling his web patterned glove back on. "He shouldn't be too far. He set up a lair around here when he first showed up, and he hasn't struck out new territory before. Just need to remember how to get there." He tugged on the web he was hanging from and flipped back up to the top of the tunnel

Kitty smiled as she turned and gave Bobby a quick kiss. "Admit it, you're having fun."

"Eh," he said with a wave of his hand.

"Whatever, this is so cool," she grinned wider, turning back to following their wall-crawling companion. "So you made your web shooters, but where did the rest of your powers come from?"

"I was at a demonstration at ESU, for some genetic work being done in a joint effort with Oscorp, and one of the test spiders got loose. It eventually ended up biting me on the hand. I was sick as hell the next few days, throwing up, passing out for most of the day; doctors couldn't figure out what was wrong with me and thought I was probably going to die. But then I woke up one morning feeling fine, went to school, and throughout the day started noticing how I had changed."

"So wait, you got bit by a spider and got super powers and became a superhero?" Bobby asked, skepticism clearly apparent on his face.

"Genetically altered, radioactive spider to be exact, and the getting to the superhero part is a little more complex than that, but yeah, that's pretty much the gist of it."

"That just doesn't seem physically possible," Bobby said.

"Hey, like I said, I probably should have died from the bite, I have no idea how it gave me powers, and neither does my only geneticist friend, Doctor Curt "The Lizard" Connors down here. Besides, you either turn into or are encased in hard, unmovable ice. How's that one possible Mr, 'I'm such a tough guy I walk around with my secret mutant codename on the front of my shirt'?"

"You're friends with the Lizard?" Kitty asked, interrupting Bobby's beginning of a comeback.

"Long story short, Doc Connors lost his arm when he was acting as a medic in one of those Third World countries that's always at war with itself. Couple of years later he tried to mix his DNA with lizard DNA as a way to regenerate human limbs, except something went wrong and now he goes all scaly and crazy sometimes. He's a good guy though, makes a mean sandwich and has helped me out of a bunch of jams. You know," he said as way of explanation, "when he's not eating people or stealing genetic altering devices"

"And he turns into a lizard monster thing," Bobby said, "and runs into some lair he made in the sewer?"

"Well, he does other things like steals stuff and tries to make other lizard people, probably why he has the Recombimator, it's faster than the formula stuff Connors used the first time. Don't know how Ock fit into it all, but we don't need to worry about him anymore.

"Anyways, we're almost there," Spidey said, turning left down the entrance to a side tunnel several feet above the main branch that had a small waterfall of muck pouring from it. "Ready for this?"

"Stop the bad guy, get the loot, I think we can handle it," Bobby said as he created an ice bridge up to the side tunnel. He took hold of Kitty's hand, projected a beam backwards to push them as they slid across and into the new path. It was wider than the others tunnels but lacked the twin brick walkways the previous tunnels had. Bobby put his free hand forward, extending the ice slide in front of them.

They had almost caught up to him when he suddenly turned. "Look out!" he yelled, just as a large shape erupted from the water and shattered the ice above it, just behind Kitty and Bobby. The two teens flew through the air and were about to crash into murky water below them when a large web sprang into existence below them. Landing on her back, Kitty could see Spidey crouched on the top of the tunnel with both hands outstretched and web shooting from both wrists.

The Lizard continued his leap upwards and slashed at the red and blue clad hero with both clawed hands, his toes spreading out and grasping onto the bricks above him. Ducking under the dagger-like talons, Spidey grabbed the Lizard's tail and used it as a swing to land on one of the curved walls of the tunnel. Pulling as he landed, he yanked the Lizard off the ceiling and tried to smash the beast into the wall underneath him. Though initially startled by the teen's action, the Lizard regained his balance and grabbed onto the wall with all four clawed appendages. "You will not ssstop me thisss time!" he roared as he landed, using the momentum generated by Spider-Man's pull to continue the movement of his tail forward, launching the web-slinger across the tunnel towards the opposite wall.

Spidey had just enough time to brace himself for impact with the wall when he found himself sliding downward. Iceman had created a slide from his perch in the web that sent Spidey sliding down and then upwards, launching him back at the Lizard. He twisted in the air to avoid the Lizard's tail that swung towards him and kicked him in the small of the back with an outstretched right foot, loosening the villain's grip on the wall and sending him splashing back into the water below. Pushing off the falling Lizard, Spidey reached up and returned to the top of the tunnel.

The Lizard resurfaced and found his foe scurrying above him towards the two still in the web. He thrust his head and chest forward, arms outstretched and let out a long, gurgling like hiss that echoed off the tunnel walls. "Doc, I didn't know you had such a lovely singing voice!" Spidey said as he sent a stream of webbing that clamped the muzzle of the Lizard shut. "But the acoustics of this place are all wrong for your range."

Bobby began freezing the water around the Lizard's waist when a churning noise behind him distracted him. He turned just in time to see a set of jaws rising from the water. Kitty let out a scream, grabbed Bobby's arm and phased them instinctively just as the jaws snapped shut, tearing through the webbing and effortlessly through Bobby's phased thigh. They fell through the webbing and into the water below. Wrapping his arm around Kitty's waist, Bobby projected a pillar of ice below him, lifting them several feet in the air as a second set of jaws tried to take a bite out of them. He could see the dark green ridges along a back and tail of the creature as it arched its body and slipped back under the surface.

"Spidey, alligators in the water!" Kitty called out as the ice tower shuddered. Below them, the first reptile had rammed its head into the base of Bobby's construct.

"Oh yeah!" the other teen said, dodging a swing of the Lizard's tail as the beast tried to free its webbed mouth. "Forgot to mention he can sometimes control other reptiles. Also, that looked like a crocodile, whoops!"

The Lizard shook his head one last time, the muscles along his snout flexing as he forced his mouth open, slowly tearing through the webbing. He let out another hissing roar directed at Spider-Man and once again lunged towards the masked hero.

"You could have told us that before you hung us over the water in a bait bag!" Bobby yelled. The second crocodile had surfaced and rammed the ice block. Bobby quickly turned around to face it and sent a blast of ice at the creature. It let out a roar as the ice shaped itself around its body and began to sink it, but Bobby watched in dismay as it rolled and thrashed in the water, cracking and shattering the ice as it hit the sides of the tunnel.

Bobby decided to change tactics. He turned his attention to the Lizard. The former scientist had grabbed Spider-Man by the ankle and threw him down into the water. Spidey quickly recovered and kicked at the knees of the figure above him, using them to push himself into a back flip and onto his feet. He didn't stay in one place for long, as he immediately jumped into a second flip, flying over one of the crocodiles that had rushed to attack his legs and landing on the side of Bobby's iceberg. He turned back to web the Lizard again when a beam of ice hit the scaled man in the chest.

Bobby, fully iced, looked down at the other man and gave a jerk of his thumb with one had, his other maintaining the beam that was slowly coating the Lizard. "Spidey, switch!"

With a nod Spidey snagged the crocodile coming up towards the X-Men with a web, swinging the creature into the wall with a wide arch. He quickly sent another pair of webs, this time pinning the creature to the wall as it snapped its jaws and tried to roll out of it. It was almost secure when his right web shooter, followed by his left gave a hissing noise of compressed air being let out of a can, and the web stream stopped.

"Not good!" he said frantically as the crocodile began to tear its way free. He lifted up his shirt, revealing a small utility belt, and began searching through the small pouches for extra web fluid cartridges. Pulling out a pair, he began reloading his web shooters, one eye on the animal struggling to free itself. "Johnny never has to fight stupid crocodiles in the sewer. He flies around in space and fights Doom and gets the girls and good press and if he ever does go into the sewer he can burn away the crap that gets stuck to his suit!"

He had just finished snapping the second cartridge in when his spider-sense flared. "Spider, look out!" he heard Kitty yell.

She dove off the ice tower and hit the stunned hero in a tackle, sending both of them crashing into the water as the untrapped crocodile lunged upwards out of the water, its short legs clawing at the ice to get at the man perched halfway up it. They pulled themselves out of the water in time to see shards of ice pelting the crocodile as it attempted to turn around for a second attempt.

Bobby kept up the assault, giving Spider-Man enough time to grab Kitty and return to the wall, higher up this time. Behind Bobby, the Lizard hammered with his fists at the ice partially encasing him, while the croc that Spidey had started to web was slipping back into the water.

Deciding, Bobby turned to Kitty. "Phase the two of you into a different tunnel, it's about to get cold in here!"

"Be careful," she said, wrapping her arms around Spidey's neck and phasing them.

"Hey what the—" Spider-Man got out before his head disappeared through the wall.

Directly on the other side of the bricks was another tunnel, similar to the one they had just left but it was completely dry. The two teens rephased and fell to the floor of this waterless tunnel. Kitty picked herself up off the ground and looked down at herself. "This is never coming out. Jean's going to be so pissed I ruined her boots.

Spidey stood and looked at the wall. "What is he going to do?" he said as he placed his hand on the bricks, as if to see if he would slip through it again.

He quickly pulled away with a sharp yelp. Frost began to creep through the cracks between the bricks and spread across the surface of the wall with tiny, crackling noises. Kitty watched them all turn icy white. "He's freezing the entire room."

"That might kill Doc Connors!" Spider-Man said in protest.

"He should be okay. He'll be knocked out and we can thaw him out and have him captured when he wakes up. By the way, you were so awesome in there!" she said, giving him a huge grin.

"Thanks," he said, rubbing his head. "I try, always nice to be appreciated for—"

She grabbed his arm and began phasing them back through the wall. "He's done, come on!"

The entire tunnel was caked in frost and icicles. The two crocodiles were half submerged in the frozen sludge, one's jaws nearly in reach of Bobby. The mutant was collapsed on one knee, his fist holding him up. He had reverted to human form and was breathing heavily, his hair and shirt soaked with sweat. "Bobby!" Kitty yelled and rushed over to him, dropping to the ground near him and sliding the rest of the way to him on her knees. She wrapped her arm over his shoulders, the other holding his head gently and lifting it to look at her.

He was smiling. "Wow, took more out of me then I thought. I'm fine babe, don't worry. Help me up."

She gave him a quick peck on the lips and draped one of his arms over her own shoulder and they stood slowly. "I'm good," he said, looking around at the frozen tunnel. With his free hand Bobby slicked his hair and smiled down at Kitty, kissing her on the forehead.

"Hate to burst your bubble kids, but where's Lizard?" Spidey asked.

"What are you talking about, he's right, oh crap," Bobby said, staring dumbfounded at the spot where the Lizard had been breaking out of the ice as Bobby had begun his personal artic storm. Where the reptile had been starting to frost stood a hollow stump of ice.

Behind them they heard a roar followed by the clanging of a metal being hit above them, echoing off the walls of the sewer. "He's heading back to the surface!" Kitty called, pointing towards a stream of sunlight pouring in from around the corner of this tunnel.

"At least we'll be out of the sewers," Bobby said, stumbling a bit but picking up speed as adrenaline took over to replace the weakness he had felt. Spider-Man was ahead of them, shooting a web up the opened manhole to a nearby building and zipping himself out of the sewers. The two mutants followed, the slower than the spider-bitten teen, reaching just after he disappeared over the edge.

"I'll ice us out, it'll seal this up behind us so he can't escape back this way," Bobby said as they stood under the hole. He wrapped his arm around Kitty's waist.

She kissed him quickly on the lips. "For luck," she said with a grin.

"Nerd," he grinned back. Pointing his other hand downward, he created a block of ice beneath them that continued to grow, lifting the two of them rapidly out of the sewer. The ice continued to rise a bit as they cleared the lip, cracking the concrete around the hole a bit.

"Oops," Bobby said, glancing down at his handiwork.

"Smooth," Kitty said.

They looked around to find themselves in a rundown alley. Graffiti covered the walls, and there was trash piled up around a pair of overflowing, rusting dumpsters. The buildings themselves were old, with ancient looking fire escapes and dirty looking windows.

At the far end, near the alleyway's opening was Spider-Man, launching a high jump attack against the Lizard, who dodged towards the mutants. Seeing Iceman, he hissed and charged at him. Bobby reacted by sending a shower of ice shards at him, but the Lizard leapt onto the wall of the nearby building without losing any speed. The ice continued down the alley, some smashing into fire escapes or the dumpsters, but a good number of them almost hit Spider-Man, who bent backwards to dodge under the ice barrage. The ice crashed into the cars out on the street, breaking windshields and some making it as far as the shop windows on the other side of the street.

"Man, the Professor's going to kill me for that one," Bobby said glumly, unafraid of the Lizard who slashed at him since he already had felt Kitty phasing their molecules.

The Lizard passed through them, landing hard on the ground behind him. Skidding to a stop, he scrambled onto all fours and snarled at them. "You can't ssstop me if you ssstay like that!"

He stood upright to leap again when a blur hit him in the side of the head, sending him reeling to the side. A red baton like object landed on the ground with a clang, followed by a figure jumping down out of the shadows of the building and scooping it up. The man kicked the Lizard completely off balanced with a strong side kick to the ribs. The Lizard fell, hitting the wall of one of the buildings.

The figure turned and they could see it was a tall man in dark red, horns sprouting from his forehead. He looked directly at Spider-Man, who had joined Kitty and Bobby. The devil spoke, his voice strong but cold.

"I told you before to keep your battles out of Hell's Kitchen."


	3. Chapter 3

**3**

"Daredevil, hey, good to see you buddy," Spider-Man stumbled, one hand rubbing the back of his neck. "Listen, about the Lizard there, I didn't want him to come to the Kitchen, we were following him in the sewers and he just came out here."

The crimson clad vigilante cocked his head towards Bobby and Kitty. "Who are these two?"

"We're X-Men," Bobby said proudly, though inside part of him was terrified of what this newcomer might do. What little he had heard about Daredevil painted him as a boogeyman, a creature that prowled the streets of New York that was merciless to his enemies. A drop of sweat dripped off Bobby's brow.

The cowled man gave the faintest hint of a smile in one corner of his mouth as he twirled the club once, resting it on his shoulder. His eyes were covered by dark lenses that matched the rest of his outfit, making it impossible to see where he was looking, or get an accurate hint at what he was thinking. But his head was turned towards the mutants, as if trying to get a sense of who they were.

"We're not here to cause trouble, if that's what you're thinking" Kitty asked, her voice not nearly as strong as Bobby's.

"And yet here you are chasing a villain through my streets. Your attacks have been erratic and irresponsible, having little effect on your opponent but causing a great deal of damage to the surrounding area. You are lucky that you didn't injure an innocent bystander."

"Look, lay off 'em Horns," Spidey spoke up. "It's my rogue, they're just trying to help. And now that you've taken care of him, we can get him locked up and return—"

"Don't be so sure," the Devil said, and he struck out to his side with the billy club. The Lizard had suddenly sprung back to life and pounced, only to have the club connect with the side of his head. He spun out to his right, his tail sweeping through the heroes. Spider-Man was able to detect the flailing attack and jumped over the tail, but the two mutants beside him had just enough time to notice Spidey leaping before the scaled clothesline hit them both in the small of the back, knocking them forward into Daredevil. The three of them tumbled to the ground, fortunately missing the tail's backswing as the Lizard tried to banish the pain in his head.

Spidey hit the Lizard with two web lines while still in the air, using them to pull himself into a drop kick. But before he could bounce away safely the big man backhanded him away. He landed with a crash into Bobby, knocking the other teen off his knees and back to the ground on top of the other two. The Lizard, hissing out a laugh, grabbed the discarded Neogenic Recombinator from where he had left it leaning against a building and darted across the alley to an inset door. Kicking hit down, he ducked into the building.

"I have to say," said Spidey, winded and laid out on his back on top of Bobby and Kitty, "this is a bit embarrassing."

"Agreed, get off of me," said Daredevil from the bottom of the pile. The other three scrambled to get out of the man's way. He quickly pulled himself back to his feet and stared at the building the Lizard had ran into. After a moment he spoke. "He's on the third floor, he's broken into an apartment on the far side and is taking hostages. We need to resolve this situation fast."

"How do you know that? Do you have x-ray vision or something?" Bobby asked, his fascination overwhelming any sense of skepticism he might have had.

Daredevil ignored him, continuing to focus on the building. "He is threatening to use that device. We don't have much time."

"I have an idea," Kitty said to them.

She quickly explained her idea and they agreed it would ensure the least amount of risk to the hostages. Bobby went into the building through the door the Lizard had entered while Spider-Man began to crawl up the wall, using quick shots of web line to pull himself quickly up to the roof. Kitty remained with Daredevil for the moment.

Twisting the bottom, the horn-masked man caused three metal grips to snap out of the top of the billy club. Pointing it towards an open window of the third floor, the end of the spring loaded club fired into the air and the grapple caught perfectly on the inside of the window sill. Tugging once, the line pulled taut and then began retracting at rapid speed, propelling him up to the window. As his feet left the ground he hooked his left arm around Kitty, pulling her with him. The approached the third story and lifting his arm he threw the thin girl higher in the air. She phased through the side of the building, landing a floor higher than Daredevil. His ascent finished and he slipped into the window head first, detaching the hook from the wood as he came forward into a roll on the hallway floor and snapped it back into the club.

He finished his roll in a crouch, his hands twisting once again to separate the long metal rod into two smaller clubs connected by the thin steel cable of the grapple. Springing into a light run, he ran past the broken door to the stairway Lizard had taken up to this floor and came to the last room along this hall, its door also broken off its hinges. He leaned up against the wall next to the apartment entrance and listen intently.

Though he had informed Spider-Man of his abilities, the two mutants did not know that he could perceive sound as sight, a powerful sonar-like ability that along with vastly enhanced senses of smell and touch allowed him to observe the world around him without the barriers of walls or other obstacles. Using the sound coming from the apartment ahead of him, he could hear the Lizard harassing several people.

"What do you want, leave us alone!" a woman with a Hispanic accent said. He could see the woman huddled in the corner of the room, standing between the Lizard and two small children.

The Lizard lowered the Neogentic Recombinator from where he had slung it to his shoulder and pointed it at the woman. "You will be the firssst to join my new order!" He began to reach for the activation controls.

Dropping his right arm at the elbow, Daredevil hit a metal heating vent with the right half of his split club. The aluminum rod sent a clanging noise reverberating through the hallway as well as the ventilation system. From the echo, he could see Iceman preparing down below. Kitty was in position on the floor above, and crawling into place outside the third floor apartment window was Spider-Man.

In the apartment, the Lizard froze at the sound, his eyes darting in every direction to find the source of the noise. The woman simply smiled at him as a second ring of metal tolled through the building. "The Devil comes for you beast, as he does for all who sin in Hell's Kitchen."

With one last strike, as both a signal and a final way to get the clearest picture of the scene possible, Daredevil ducked around the doorframe into the room. He stayed low to the ground, dodging underneath the beam of energy that erupted from the end of the stolen device wielded by the Lizard. The shot tore through the wall of the apartment, sending splinters in every direction and catching parts of the wallpaper on fire. One of the kids, a little girl, screamed. The mother wrapped her arms around them and held them close to her as they ducked down on the ground. Continuing the momentum of his turn into the room, Daredevil slung the right hand side of the club in mid spin towards the firing villain. It arched around the Lizard's legs, the metal cable wrapping around his scaled ankles and locking into places as the baton twisted itself around the line it was attached to. Gripping the end he still held with both hands, the Devil yanked hard, pulling the Lizard off balance and tumbling onto his back. A second beam shot from the Recombinator, this one firing wildly through the top of the doorway wall and continuing upwards, parts of the ceiling shattering or combusting as his arms instinctively rose in a vain and almost comical attempt to regain his balance.

"Now Lizard, if you aren't going to play nice with your toys we're just going to take them away," came a jibe from the window as Spider-Man snagged the Recombinator with a web and pulled it out of the Lizard's hands. He dropped out of site as soon as he had a hold on it.

As the Lizard crashed onto his back, Kitty fell out of ceiling and landed on top of him. With a grin she grabbed onto the shoulders of the villain and phased the two of them through the floor. They fell through the apartment below and into a dark laundry room on the first floor. As they made the long drop from the high ceiling to the floor below, Kitty brought her knees up and used them to kick off the chest of the body under her. With an arching, graceful flip she spun backwards and phased through a row of dryers, allowing the complexity of the parts she had to phase through slow her down until she stopped waist deep through the floor. Using her powers she rose out of the machines and floor to step gently onto the ground. The Lizard, who had unphased as Kitty retracted her touch, crashed through a folding table and landed with a thud on the floor.

Bobby rushed into the room from where he had stood in the doorway and began to form an ice block around the dazed reptile. For once since this misadventure had begun, the ice was not knocked away and the two mutants watched as the cold slowed the Lizard down. With a slump of his shoulders, Bobby let out a sigh of relief as Kitty grinned at him from the other side of the ice.

"Gotta say, glad your plan worked 'cat. Chasing this guy all over the city was getting old."

"Not exactly the date we planned huh?" she said.

"Nope. I don't mind the hero part though," he started.

"Naturally."

"But next date let's avoid the sewer."

"Totally."

"So now what?"

"Wait for Spidey, he said he could find a way to change Doctor Connors back."

"When did he say that? I don't remember that."

Kitty rolled her eyes. "Back in the sewer, how did you not hear that, you were standing right there, staring right at him."

"Must have missed that part. Of course you didn't tough," he said sarcastically.

"Huh? What's that supposed to mean?" she asked, her face scrunched up in confusion.

Bobby couldn't help but smile. Kitty was adorable when confused, and being as smart as she was, he didn't get to see that look to often. "Nothing, don't worry about it," he said shaking his head.

She held the confused look a moment longer and then opened her mouth in astonishment. "Bobby Drake, are you jealous!"

"What!" he looked incredulous. "No, of course not! What's there to be jealous of?" he added, trying to cover it as best as he could.

She saw right though it. "Well, he's super smart, agile, fantastic body, he's funny, do I need to continue?"

"I hate you sometimes."

"Uh huh, sure you do. Okay, so maybe I've flirted a little, but it's not every day that... Bobby, the ice!"

He glanced down and saw it too. Little cracks were forming on the ice, and the unfrozen head of the Lizard was beginning to move slightly.

"Holy crap!" Bobby exclaimed.

"This doesn't make any sense, he shouldn't be able to react like this!"

"Is he part Logan or something?" Bobby said as he began to send streams of cold into the forming cracks, sealing them up as quickly as they appeared and piling more ice onto him.. Somewhere underneath the frozen form, near the tail, they heard a large crack. "We need to get Spidey down here now with his magic cure."

"Right, I'm—"

Another ground shuddering crack echoed and they realized too late that it wasn't the ice cracking, it was the floor. The extra weight of the Lizard and ice was too much for the old tile and wood to take, and with a third crack the frozen body and a screaming Kitty fell into the darkness below. There was a crash, the sound of ice shattering, then silence.

Bobby ran to the edge of the hole and looked down. He couldn't see much. With little light streaming in from the dim laundry room, and seemingly no windows in the basement, he couldn't even see how far down the ground was.

"Kitty!" he called out, scanning the blackness for any sign of movement.

"Ugh," came an almost disappointed moan from down below. "I'm okay, phased to break the fall. This really sucks."

"Do you see Lizard?'

"I can barely see my own hand. I have no clue if – AHHH!"

"Kitty!" Bobby yelled out, diving into the hole and ice sliding to the ground. He hit the unseen floor at a sharp angle, stumbling into a roll and into a crouched defensive stance in his ice form. Once again thankful for his ability to both goof off and still pay attention during Logan's training sessions, he was somewhat used to fighting blinded. He calmed his breathing and attempted to ignore the rapid beating of his heart, focusing instead on sounds of the basement, taking in the dripping sound of melting ice, the creak of the broken wood above, and searching for anything that might alert him to danger.

Even training and alertness didn't prepare him from the swiftness of the attack to his back. Claws dug into his icy form, ripping long gashes from his right shoulder blade down to his left side. He cried out, more in surprise than pain, as he fell forward to the ground. Pain was a curious sensation when he was in his ice form; it was painful, yes, but detached as if he felt it happening from a great distance. Ignoring the burning sensation coming from his back, he rolled over to see the Lizard's outline standing in the dim halo of light shining from the gaping hole above them. He could see bits of ice dangling off of the tattered lab coat,

"You will not ssstop me," he hissed. "I will form my army of lizards to conquer the humans. We will show you who is sstrongessst."

Wincing, Bobby began to sit up. "And how do you plan on doing that without your gun?"

"I will get it back!" he said, kicking Bobby in the face. The teen fell back down, hitting his frozen head on the hard cement. It didn't crack, but it hurt worse then the claws and he instinctively brought his hand up to hold it. The Lizard walked out of the circle of light to stand over the X-Man, raising his foot to stomp down.

"Hey, what the? I thought you phased through things Kitty," Bobby heard above him through the hole in the floor and ringing in his head. The Lizard froze, turning his head back to the gap in the floorboards. The lips of his long snout pulled back to reveal his jagged teeth as he darted away from Bobby, scaling up the backside of the ice slide that lead down to the basement and latching onto the underside of the ceiling just inches from the opening. Bobby tried to call out in warning, but his head hurt too much to make more than a concerned, but quiet, groan.

Spider-Man had continued to talk as he crossed the room, appearing at the edge of the broken wood and peering down, the Recombinator lashed to his back with a strap made of webbing. "I don't want to know what naughty things you two crazy kids are doing down there, but since the building's on fire you might want to hurry up. DD and I got everyone else out through and it's only the top floors so far, so we have some—"

He suddenly pulled his right shoulder back as the Lizard swung himself out from under the floor and pounced at Spider-Man. He missed the web-strewn hero with the missile like kick, but as his momentum pulled him forward into the upper room he snagged the device on Spidey's back with a clawed hand, ripping through the webbing and pulling the Recombinator free. He turned the metal casing back towards Spider-Man, who was still reeling off balance from the dodge, and caught him in the face. Spidey flew into the side of a washing machine.

The Lizard grinned into the hole, waving the machine. "Gotssss it back!" he taunted Iceman, who was propelling himself from the basement on a column of ice.

"Not for long Lizard Breathe, I've got a ton of ice with your name on it!" He stretched out one of his hands towards the quickly approaching enemy and prepared to send a volley of ice shards at him. But suddenly there was a noise behind him.

"Oops, guess I phased too far. Hello?"

Bobby turned to the sound of Kitty's voice, ready to warn her to watch out, when he felt a sharp pain in his arm and he fell tumbling down the ice structure he had just made, landing in a heap at Kitty's feet. She screamed and ran to him, rolling him over as he tried to stand up.

Meanwhile, the ice Bobby had been firing hit their mark, pelting the snout and chest of the Lizard and sending the scaled monster onto his back. The still smoking Recombinator flew from his hands, spinning in the air once before a webline stuck to its side and it was pulled back into the waiting arms of Spider-Man. Lizard flipped to his haunches, ready to charge when the sound of sirens hit his ears. Added to that was the red clad devil that had just stepped into the room. Knowing that any fight would eventually leave him captured, he decided to cut his losses and escape. He scrambled to the side of the room, breaking a boarded up window and darting into an alley behind the burning building.

As Daredevil followed the Lizard, Spidey ran to the hole to check on the two mutants. "You guys all right down there? Need help getting out?"

He stepped back in surprise as Kitty phased out of the top of Bobby's pillar of ice, the translucent mutant hanging off of her with his left arm draped around her shoulders. They floated in air for a moment before coming to rest on the tile floor of the laundry room. Once they hit solid ground Bobby let go of Kitty, getting his balance as he rubbed his right shoulder.

"What happened? He didn't actually hit you with this, did he?" Spidey said, lifting the Recombinator to emphasize his point.

"Yeah, stings like hell, that thing's hot," Bobby said.

Spidey leaned in real close, taking a close look at the blackened area on Bobby's frozen form. "This thing's configured with Lizard's DNA. But you're not changing so I guess that's a good thing."

"Changing?"

"Yeah, it's pretty instantaneous, so I think you'll be fine. Maybe 'cause you're a mutant or because your all walking block of ice on us right now. Either way, something would have happened by now."

"Great, remind me never to come to the city again," Bobby said, turning to Kitty.

"Tell me about it, it's been an interesting day."

Daredevil poked his head through the window. "The Lizard has escaped, and the fire department is here. There is nothing more we can do here."

They all left through the window, using their various abilities to get up the building on the other side of the alley, and heading several buildings away from the blaze. They settled under the shade of a water tower and Daredevil turned to them. "If a villain enters Hell's Kitchen again, allow me to handle him. There has been enough damage done today from your interference."

Bobby stared at the masked man. "You were with us when he got away, don't go blaming this all on us."

"At lease we got the Neogenic Recombinator away from him," Kitty said, hoping to placaite the two.

"She's right, he might be dangerous, but he's a lot safer without this thing," Spidey added.

"And I thank you for that assistance. But I tell you again, stay out of Hell's Kitchen." He turned to the edge of the building, firing the grappling hook from the end of his billy club and swinging off the building.

"Well he's pleasant," Bobby said, crossing his arms and watching Daredevil leave. Only when the vigilante had dropped out of site did Bobby begin to unice.

"He has a lovely singing voice though, you should hear during the holidays," Spidey said, sitting down to fiddle with the device.

"What are you doing?" Kitty asked, joining him.

"Trying to see if I can reconfigure this to turn Doc back to his happy go lucky human self. Problem is I don't know much about this. I should probably get it back to my lab and take a look."

"Your lab? You have your own lab?" Kitty asked in awe.

"Oh yeah, it's pretty high tech, nothing but the best. Well, if you consider a desk in a basement the best that is. But I have I have some tools and the Internet and there's nothing you can't find with a little googling."

"Cool, need some help?"

"Probably, but, secret identity and all, best if I keep it."

"Oh," Kitty answered, dejection clearly audible in her voice. "I understand."

"Actually," Bobby said from the edge of the roof. "I think you might have to take us."

They lifted their heads to look up at him. He was standing facing them, his arms outstretched, his eyes opened a wide. His left arm was fine, the sleeve of the t-shirt he wore a little torn and his skin scratched a bit on his bicep, but the rest of the arm was its normal, lightly tanned flesh colored. In fact, aside from a few scratches and holes in his clothes, Bobby looked fine and like a normal teenager. But starting halfway on the right side of his chest, up his shoulder and down his entire arm, Bobby was made of ice.

"It won't change back," he said, with a sheepish, worried grin.

They just stared at him for a full minute before Spider-Man spoke at last.

"Well that's not good."


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Huge shout out to everyone who messaged me in some way asking for more. Sorry it took so long.  
**

* * *

**4**

"Yeah it's not good!" Bobby yelled. "My arm is made of ice!"

"At least that's somewhat normal for you," Spider-Man pointed out.

"Normal is being able to change back."

"I know, but you could be turning into a lizard so this is at least better than that." Spidey stood from where he had been examining the Recombinator and walked to Bobby, focusing on the arm and area of the chest that was now made of ice. "Does it feel any different than it usually does when you turn to ice?"

"No. It stings a bit where I was shot, but other than that it feels exactly the same, except I can't change it back."

"Full mobility?"

"Yeah."

"Interesting."

"What if you changed fully and tried changing back again?" Kitty offered.

With a shrug, Bobby stood with his arms down but outstretched and fully changed into his ice form for a moment before shifting back into flesh and blood. Again his right arm did not change back with the rest of his body, but now a larger portion of his right torso stayed unchanged.

"It spread, don't activate your powers any more," Spidey said. He brought his hand up to his face, pinching his nose through his mask as he began pacing the rooftop, muttering to himself. "Okay, so it affected him funny because he's either A.) a mutant or B.) was in ice form or C.) because of some other bizarre reason I'll never pin down. But if I could recalibrate the Recombinator with his DNA, that might reverse the process. No that might not work, because it might be compromised, which means..."

Spider-Man continued to pace to roof as Kitty walked to Bobby. She slipped under his unfrozen arm and rested her head on his chest. He squeezed her with his arm, kissing the top of his head. She looked up and smiled. "We'll figure this out."

Spidey had stopped pacing and then walked to them. "All right. We'll need to get back to my lab where I can actually reconfigure the device, can't do anything on this roof. But if I take you there, you can figure out who I am. So I probably should just tell you, it'll make everything easier."

He didn't move to take off his mask, and didn't say anything else. Kitty waited a moment before pulling herself away from Bobby, moving to the other hero. She gave him a quick hug and stepped back. "You don't have to worry about us, we know all about keeping secrets. It's safe with us."

He took a deep breath, at last saying, "My name is Peter Parker. I'm sixteen years old, and I'm still in high school. I'd take off my mask but you never know who's watching. Anyways, if either of you have a cell phone; I can call us a ride."

Kitty reached into her small backpack, which had somehow survived this entire trip and took out a small phone, handing it to Peter. She paused for a moment as a sudden thought entered her mind.

"Wait a minute, Parker? I know that name. You work for the Daily Bugle!"

"Yeah, I work on their website."

"How do you work for a paper that is constantly bashing you? It be like us, I don't know, working for the government," Bobby jumped into the conversation as Peter began dialing the phone.

"Pays the bills, web fluid can get expensive. Come on MJ, pick up." He was pacing again, the phone pressed to his ear through his mask.

"No, you don't just work on the website, that's not how I know you," Kitty said. "You take pictures for them of, um, yourself. I have one on my desktop at home."

"You take pictures of yourself as Spider-Man and a paper who hates you gives you money for them?" Bobby laughed. "That's awesome."

Spidey didn't respond, as whoever he was calling picked up. "MJ? Hey it's me. Yeah, I'm okay. Listen I've got a bit of a problem and – I told you, _I'm_ okay, but, it's hard to explain. Can you borrow your Dad's van and come get us? We're on that old theater in Hell's Kitchen. Yeah, _we're_, long story. Thanks MJ, I know I owe you." He closed the phone and handed it back to Kitty. "Okay, she'll be here in a few."

"She?" Kitty said, with a raised eyebrow. "Girlfriend?"

"Ex. We've managed to piece together our friendship after a lot of crap, I don't really want to get into it."

"Okay," Kitty said, letting the subject drop.

The three spent the next twenty minutes talking to each other. Kitty telling of their life in the Institute with occasional input from Bobby, while Peter did his best to describe the chaos of trying to balance school, work, heroics and time for the few friends he had.

"Why do you keep doing it then?" Bobby asked. He hadn't said much in the conversation, his thoughts mostly focusing on his arm and his girlfriend's distracted attention.

Spidey looked down and away, reliving an obviously painful memory the he knew would inevitably be brought up. "When I first got my powers, I was cocky with them, thought I could make some money. Long story short, I made some bad choices and my uncle ended up dead because of it. And one of the things he used to say to me is always echoing in my head now."

"What's that?" Kitty asked tentatively.

"With great power comes great responsibility."

Bobby just nodded. He might still not like this Parker kid personally, but he could understand the drive he had.

"Plus, I get to run around in tights, something I've always wanted to do in public but was always afraid to."

Kitty just shook her head. "What is it with super powered boys never being serious? All you do is joke around."

"Don't look at me," Bobby tried to look innocent. "I'm pretty serious in a real fight."

"Hey, I was scrawny nerdy guy before the spider bit me, so now I have a chance to speak my mind like I never could before, so don't knock it until you try it," Spidey said.

The blaring of a car horn reached their ears from the back alley of the theater they were sitting on. Peter jumped from his perch and peeked his head over the side of the building. "She's here," he said looking back at the other two teens. "There's a fire escape right over here, meet you on the ground!" He leapt over the edge.

"Showoff," Bobby muttered under his breath as he and Kitty made their way down the metal ladders.

"Oh please," Kitty muttered right back at him.

They found Spider-Man sitting in the open door of a large white van with the words "Watson Pluming" stenciled into a logo on the side. He was talking to a girl sitting in the passenger seat, her face obscured by the frame of the van.

"It's not like I _like _going into the sewers!" he was telling the girl. He saw the two walking over and waved them on. "There you are, get in. The sooner we get going the better chance we'll have of fixing this."

"Thanks again Peter for—" Kitty began, but she was cut off by the redhead behind the wheel, her face still hidden from the new passengers as she had turned to look forward as they began to climb in.

"I can't believe you told them who you are. What's the point of a secret identity if half the world knows it?"

"Come on MJ, it's not that bad."

"Uh, lets see, me, Gwen, Nick Fury, probably most of the government, Norman Osborn, Daredevil, Johnny, now these two random people."

"They aren't random people MJ, they're X-Men."

With her flame colored hair whipping behind her, MJ snapped her head to look at the two just entering the van. Bobby was stunned. She seemed at first to have the girl next door look. Her hair had the amazing deep color like Jean's, but was sloppier and clearly not doted over like the telepaths. Her skin was pale and smooth, but here and there were tiny acne scars. He couldn't see much of her body due to both the car seat she was looking around and the baggy overalls she wore, but he got the distinct impression this girl could be a heartbreaker if she wanted to be. Her eyes denied that, the vibrant green orbs wide in shock as she looked at the mutants. Bobby wasn't always the best at reading people, but he had the distinct impression this was a girl who lacked some self confidence.

"Hi, I'm Bobby Drake," he extended a hand to the girl when she didn't really say anything. She glanced at the arm and her eyes opened wider. He followed her gaze and realized he had extended his frozen arm. "Oops, let's try that again," he said, giving her his left hand which she shook with a grin, snapping out of her daze.

"Oh my God, you're Iceman."

"The one and only," he said with a smile.

"I'm your biggest fan," she said with a grin. "I downloaded all the videos I could find about your fight with that Juggernaut guy. I'm Mary Jane Watson by the way."

"That was a good fight, and it's a pleasure to meet you," Bobby said, slipping into the passenger seat next to the girl.

Kitty just rolled her eyes and climbed into the back of the van with Peter close behind her. He closed the door and MJ hit the gas. He sat down on the floor next to Kitty, placing the Recombinator across his lap.

"Do you think we'll be able to fix Bobby's powers?" she asked him.

"I hope so. We have to at least try to load this thing with his DNA and just hope it's clean. If it's already been rewritten it could leave him permanently frozen. Any other ideas you can think of for us to try?"

She shook her head. "I have to admit I haven't had too much experimental genetics experience."

"Yeah, me neither. Well, except for what Doc Connors went over with me about my own changes."

She nodded absently, not taking her eyes off of him. He turned his head to look back at her. "What is it? Don't tell me I've got a stain on the eye again, those are so hard to get out."

"Nothing, just wondering if you're going to take it off."

"Oh, yeah, guess I can do that now."

The sound of MJ and Bobby talking in the front of the van hung between them for a moment.

"So, are you going to do it?" Kitty finally asked.

"It's always weird, okay?"

"You realize I have a name, and a place of employment. I could find baby pictures of you if I really wanted."

"You could?"

She smirked at him.

"Why would you want baby pictures?"

"Just take off the mask Peter."

With a very visible sigh, he reached a webbed hand to the top of his head and gripped the mask. He slowly brought the hand back down, dragging the cloth down with it. It pulled out from where it had been tucked underneath the tight material of the suit, until finally it was off his head.

He glanced back at Kitty with a sheepish smile. He had light brown hair with equally light brown eyes, set on a narrow head. He looked so average that Kitty was almost taken aback. He could have been any guy she passed in the halls at school. Well, she admitted to herself, any cute guy. She wasn't sure what it was about him, maybe the eyes or the way he held his body as he continued to give her the nervous smile, but his face screamed nerd and she found that very endearing. She gave him a grin.

"What?"

"Nothing, just expected you to have eight eyes or something," she joked.

"Yeah, like Jameson would let me work at the Bugle if I was anything but normal looking."

"Well, I think you look good."

"Thanks."

In the front seat, Bobby was being bombarded with questions from MJ, most revolving around his life as an X-Man. "Yeah," he said, "we call it the Danger Room. It's not as bad as they make it out to be, most of the time. It's actually pretty cool because of the holograms. We have a fairly decent Lord of the Rings program we're working on."

"That is so cool. Must be nice," she said wistfully.

"It can get hard, with all the training. Plus you never know when your arm will be stuck as ice. Or when some angry mob or supervillain will be coming for you. I'm just surprised you're so open to it. Most people tend to hate mutants, or at least scared of sitting next to one in a van."

She laughed a bit and rolled her eyes. "My—God I have no idea what he is these days. Peter spends his days crawling on walls and beating down bad guys. I've pretty much accepted just because you have powers you aren't some monster or something. If you just want to live your life or risk it saving other people, you're okay in my book."

"Glad that I'm okay then," he smiles.

"You're more than okay, you're Iceman," she beamed back at him as they pulled up in front of an old two story house in the midst of seemingly endless clones of it. Peter had slipped on a pair of cargo pants and a long sleeve shirt that MJ had left in the back of the van and opened the side door and jumped out. He peered up and down the street, making sure they were alone before opening the passenger door, waving Bobby out.

"Come on, my aunt's not home but no point in giving the neighbors an eyeful." He stuck his head into the open door. "Thanks MJ, I have no idea what I'd do without you."

"I know. Mind if I come over after I bring the van back?"

"Sure, come on by."

"I'll go with you, give the boys a chance to bond," Kitty said. Bobby spun around to give her a dirty look, but she just smirked and with a little wave the van pulled away from the curb. Kitty could see in the side mirror the two boys moving to a basement door on the side of the house.

The girls sat in silence as they drove the two blocks to where Watson family lived. The redhead parked the car in the driveway and they both got out. MJ was walking along the side of the van back towards the street when Kitty phased directly through the side to stand in front of her, hands on her hips and anger in her eyes. Mary Jane gave a screech of surprise at the girl's sudden appearance and jumped back, her hands instinctively coming up in front of her as the numerous of self defense classes she had taken had driven into her head.

"Sorry, didn't mean to scare you like that," Kitty said, her eyes softening for a moment before returning to their steely gaze at the other girl. "But what exactly do you think you're doing with my boyfriend?"

"Your boyfriend?" MJ asked, straightening back up and returning the look the shorter girl was giving her. "What are you doing with my boyfriend?"

"I'm just talking to him. He's funny, smart, interesting. Besides, I thought you two broke up?"

"We did, I don't know, there was a lot of crap. I don't want to get into it."

Kitty couldn't help but smile. "That's exactly what he said. If it makes you feel any better, he's head over heels for you."

It wasn't the reaction Kitty expected. MJ slumped down against the side of the van, her arms crossing over her chest. "I know, it drives me crazy."

Kitty leaned up against with her right shoulder, facing her. "So if you're both totally crazy for each other, what's stopping you? Why break up?"

"Spider-Man," MJ said softly in case anyone heard her. "The Green Goblin kidnapped me to get to Pete, and there was a fight on the Brooklyn Bridge and I almost got killed. He freaked out and we broke up because he's scared for me." She let out a little snort. "Like the Goblin isn't going to come for me again if he ever breaks out of whatever hole Nick Fury is keeping him in just because Peter broke up with me."

"Really, especially when you're still hanging out with each other."

"It took me a while to get to this point, and then you come along and—"

"Don't worry, I've got a man," Kitty smiled at the thought of Bobby. "And for once he's a good one."

"And yet you keep flirting with Peter," MJ accused.

"I wouldn't call it flirting, well not much. It's mostly nice to talk about nerdy science things with someone for once. Bobby's smart but he's no genius. Plus it messes with Bobby and I'll get to tease him about how jealous he gets later on."

MJ laughed. "You're pretty bad."

"I know, but with the number of pranks he's pulled on me and the rest of our friends, he deserves it."

"Sorry if I was paying too much attention to Bobby. Yeah I had kinda a schoolgirl crush on Iceman, but I don't want to be that girl who comes between two people."

"Me neither. And since I had kinda a schoolgirl crush on Spider-Man. I think we're even. And you're definitely getting to Peter, flirting or not. Just give it time."

"Thanks," the redhead sighed, pushing herself off the van. She turned back to Kitty and managed a smile. "I think I just really needed to hear that."

"Anytime," Kitty said. She stood up and joined her new friend. "We should probably get going."

"Yeah, Bobby will be worried; Peter will be too buried in that gun thingie to notice for a while. How did you all meet up anyways?"

The girls walked back to the Parker house, Kitty explaining the long road that went from a quiet date in the city to chasing super villains through sewers and superhero teamups. By the time they reached the house, having taken their time, Kitty was on to explaining how she and Bobby had first gotten together. They didn't bother going to the front door of the house but over to the side and through the door down to the basement. They reached the bottom of the steps and Kitty looked around. It was a typical basement, a lot like her own at her parent's house with boxes and various items stacked up. However, one side of the large room was clearly Peter's personal space. It was one part office, one part lab, one part lounge. There were several desks and tables. One had several computers in half build states, parts strewn about around them. Another had a fully functioning computer, and what looked like stacks of papers and several file folders, obviously work Peter brought home from the Bugle. A third desk had an overhead light and magnifying glass, along with various tools. It was at this desk Peter sat, the Recombinator laid out across the top with cables leading back to the computer.

Bobby sat on one of a few old couches that sat on that side of the basement. He was fiddling with another of Peter's partially complete computers laid out on a coffee table in front of him, a difficult task since he only had one arm he could safely use on the electronic equipment. MJ waved and said hi to Peter as they came in, who gave her a brief glance and smile before sliding back across the floor on his desk chair to check some readouts on the computer monitor. She shrugged and walked over to an old beat up refrigerator that looked as if Peter had repaired it himself.

"Want anything? We have some soda down here," she asked Kitty.

Kitty just smiled at the use of we, and asked for a diet. She sat next to Bobby and kissed his cheek. "How you holding up?"

"I'm all right, helps to be playing around with this, keeps my mind off everything."

"I don't help?" she said with a fake pout. "Thanks a lot."

He kissed her softly on the forehead. "You help the most."

"Hey Kitty, check this out," Peter called over to her, his eyes locked on the computer screen.

"Want me to stay with you?" she asked, giving him a telling look, and he realized then that no matter what he was reading into her and Peter, she was his. He couldn't help but grin.

"No, go help him, hopefully between you two geniuses you can fix my powers."

She gave him a rough but quick kiss on the lips. She pulled back and stood up, taking the Diet Coke MJ had just returned with for her. She gave the redhead mischievous smile. "Do me a favor Bobby," Kitty whispered loud enough for MJ and Bobby to hear, "flirt with MJ for me, she's trying to make Peter jealous."

Bobby gave the redhead a questioning look. She replied with a half smile and shrug, her emerald eyes reflecting the mischief in Kitty's sapphire eyes. He just shook his head and held it with his ice hand, mutter about what head just gotten himself into under his breath. The girls quietly chuckled and Kitty went to go see what Peter had found as Mary Jane took her place next to Bobby on the couch.

"For the record, I do think you're really cute, and everything Kitty has told me about you makes me a little jealous," she said, taking a sip of her soda.

"It's nice to know I'm doing something right," he said, his eyes drifting over to watch Kitty. She was leaning against the back of Peter's chair, reading the screen in front of them. As if sensing his eyes she glanced back, giving Bobby a wink and a shake before bringing her attention back to the task at hand. MJ laughed loudly, and Peter looked back at the both of them, just the thinnest glimmer of contempt for Bobby on his face. But like Kitty he quickly ignored the distraction.

Soon the two teens were debating back and forth in technobabble that neither Bobby nor MJ could understand whenever there was a pause long enough in their far less complicated conversation. "It looks like Peter finally found someone who can keep up with him," MJ said at one point. Bobby couldn't tell if she was amazed or jealous, but imagined it was some of both.

"If you and Pete ever come up and visit some time I'll introduce you to Forge. He puts both of them to shame. His mutant power is technobabble."

"Yikes. I mean, I can find my way around a computer fine, but we're sixteen, I don't think we shouldn't be doing rocket science."

"Couldn't agree with you more," he said as they continued to watch them work.

After another half hour of work, Kitty and Peter stood and turned to Bobby and MJ at the same moment, a bit of apprehension splashed on their faces.

"Okay," Peter started slowly, "we think we've done as much as we can. It was a little easier to do than I thought it would be, but no way to tell if it will work unless we try."

"You think maybe we should call Forge?" Bobby asked, hesitant to show anything less that totally confidence in his girlfriend.

"Do you really trust something he's fixed to work?" Kitty asked.

"Good point."

"The good news is the Recombinator isn't broken in any way," Peter said. "I don't think there would have been anything we could have done then. We just need to figure out how to reprogram it, and I think we've got that. Changing Doc Connors back will be easy to do, I think. Bobby, you're going to be a bit tougher."

"Why's that?" he said with just the slightest flick of his eyes in fear at his still froze right side.

"To reprogram it, we need to give it a DNA sample for it to use as a template when it does the genetic reconstruction, and well..."

"We don't know how much of you DNA is contaminated with whatever changes it did the first time to you," Kitty finished.

"What happens if it is?" he had to ask.

"I don't think anything worse than what's already happened, though there's always the chance you'll change fully into ice. Or you could lose your powers, but I think that's a very slim chance," Peter said, rubbing his hand on the back of his neck. He tried for a smile and it did little to reassure Bobby. "Do you want to think about it or...?"

"Let's just get it over with," Bobby sighed. "What do you need from me?"

"A piece of hair should be enough. The Recombinator can scan the DNA and then we can configure it."

They plucked a piece of hair and Peter took it to the workbench. Kitty slipped her arms around Bobby's waist, her head resting on his chest. Despite everything, Bobby felt content for that moment. Thoughts about what may or may not happen in the next five minutes melted away and he was able to savor what he felt for the young woman in his arms, and more importantly what she felt for him. He wasn't sure we're their relationship was going, part of him didn't really care, but he could there was something very real about their relationship. No joke cracking kid in pajamas was going to come between them, no matter how much teasing and hinting he saw. Some other time, some other universe maybe, but not here.

Of course, it wouldn't stop him from giving her hell about it later though.

The thought made him grin like a madman. He kissed the top of her head and pried her arms off of him. He stood in the middle of an open spot in the basement floor, arms outstretched and ready. "Hit me with your best shot. You want me iced or normal?"

"Uh," Peter stuttered as he took the Recombinator from the table and tried to find the best way to hold it steady, as it was never intended to be a handheld device. "I don't know."

"Uniced," Kitty said, standing by MJ, who had stood in anticipation of what was about to happen.

Peter and Bobby both nodded, and Peter took aim.

"You're sure about this, right?" Bobby asked.

"Sure, piece of cake. Just need to ignore the throbbing of my spider-sense as I do this."

"What!" He was about to rush over and throttle the other boy when Peter, his breath held and eyes squeezed shut, pushed the activation button.

* * *

**A/N Part II: The final chapter should be up within the next few days. And I really mean that this time.**


	5. Chapter 5

**5**

The bright blue beam that shot from the end of the machine hit Bobby square in the chest, lifting the mutant off of his feet and sending him into the boxes stacked behind him. He disappeared in an avalanche of ripped cardboard and Christmas decorations as the other three teens stood too stunned at the power in the shot to do anything other than stare at the now chaotic box pile with looks of shock and horror.

"Oops?" Peter croaked out.

That tiny break in the silence spurred Kitty into action, the others quickly following behind her as she rushed the boxes. Grabbing tangled strings of lights and garland, she threw them aside. MJ and Peter were moving to help when Bobby sat up, a plastic candy cane hanging from his ear and a fresh burn mark on his tattered t-shirt. He rocked forward onto his hands and knees, crawling out of the pile completely, breathing heavily.

"Bobby, it worked, you arm is normal!" Kitty cried in happiness. "Peter you're a genius!"

"Are you okay?" MJ asked as he started to cough.

"Trash can," he managed to get out between coughs, a tiny nod towards a plastic bin on the ground near the edge of the desk. MJ immediately grabbed it and tossed it to Peter, who slammed it down in front of Bobby just in time for him to puke next to the waiting container.

They all tried to look away as he continued to vomit, but even when they did the sounds still reached their ears. Finally he stopped, rolling over onto his side slightly away from what was left of his lunch, and let out a long groan.

Kitty picked up a handful of leftover fast food napkins from the coffee table and knelt down next to Bobby, wiping his mouth for him. "How do you feel?"

He weakly opened one eye to look at her. "Like I puked out my liver. Is it in the trash can?"

"You missed the trash can, honey."

"Oh. Is it on the floor?"

"No, I think it's still in you."

"All right then." Bobby closed his eye again, letting out a long sigh. He laid there for a few minutes breathing slowly before he brought his hand up to his face, rubbing his eyes and forehead. He started to stand, and with Peter and Kitty's help he managed to get back onto the couch. MJ handed him a bottle of water from the refrigerator and he took a few small sips. Seeing his right arm for the first time since the blast, he held it in front of him and moved his fingers tentatively. "So it worked?"

"You're not ice any more," Peter said, "but we don't really know if anything happened to your powers."

Bobby closed his eyes and let the temperature of his hand drop, willing the cells to shift from normal, living tissue to the crystalline ice form his mutant powers allowed him to change into. The reaction in his hand was immediate. There was a crackling sound; his hand felt as if it had suddenly gone numb, and everything around it became harder to feel. Opening his eyes he saw his hand in its light blue, almost fully opaque, but not quite, state. Now for the true test, he thought. Reversing the process, he released a relieved sigh as his hand returned to flesh and bone.

"It's good to be normal. Well, you know," Bobby said with a shrug. He turned his eyes onto Peter. "I guess I owe you one."

"Don't worry about it," Peter said with a dismissing wave of his hand. "You got messed up fighting my villains and plus Kitty helped."

"Either way, thanks."

Kitty, who had been sitting on Bobby's left and hanging off his arm, leaned up and gave him a peck on his cheek. "I'm just happy you're okay."

"Me too, me too." He caught her lips with his own for a second, but broke it to talk to Peter again. "So how do we stop Lizard?"

"Aren't we in enough trouble? We've already missed the train, and I'm sure Peter can handle this," Kitty said.

"No such thing as enough trouble," Bobby said with an almost evil smirk. "Besides, even if Peter could take the Lizard himself, when the Recombinator's involved its best if he has someone watching his back."

"Okay, you can explain to the Professor why after trusting us to behave and keep a low profile we're going out for the second time today chasing bad guys."

"Whoa, who said we're going out again?" Peter said.

"You're just going to let Doc Connors stay like that?" Bobby asked.

"Of course not, but we still need to recalibrate it to human DNA, and then we need to find him."

"One thing at a time I suppose, let's recalibrate," Kitty said. She gave Bobby another kiss before standing and joining Peter by the workbenches. Peter had laid the Recombinator back onto the table, the genetic scanner's panel open and ready for a new sample.

"MJ, I'll need one of your hairs," Peter said. He was distracted by something he noticed on focusing lens.

The redhead's eyebrows closed in on her nose. "Why me?"

Peter didn't answer right away. He had moved the magnifying glass mounted on the desk and was examining the front of the device, using a small flashlight to examine deep the dark nozzle. He finally glanced up at his onetime girlfriend. "Mutant DNA and, well, whatever mine is probably won't change Connors back. In fact, who knows what might happen to him. But some normal human DNA should revert any changes the Lizard DNA made to his baseline structure."

"How did he change back and forth to begin with?" Kitty said.

She handed Peter a string of MJ's long hair and he placed it in the scanning receptacle. With the press of a button the machine gave a beep and began its analysis. He turned back to the others and continued talking. "He used some sort of serum the first time; he hoped it would just boost the regenerative properties of his lost arm, but it took over and changed him. He uses a chemical antidote solution to keep it in check, but it's always been a little flakey. This should do a better job, if it will still work."

"Still works?"

Peter let out a sigh and rubbed the back of his neck. "It looks like between all the times it's been used today and all the abuse it's taken in the fights, the lens is damaged. It should still work, but it could fracture at some point if it's used too much more. I'm sure the university would do regular maintenance after each use, but I don't have the parts or any idea how to fix it if I did here."

"What happens if it had broken when using it on me?" Bobby said.

"Let's not worry about that, I checked it before that and it was fine then. It probably just would have overloaded and shut down. Or exploded. Anyways, we have another shot, maybe two before it craps out on us completely." The machine gave another beep as a green light began to flash on the small screen. Peter quickly read the message before snapping the metal casing closed. "Okay, locked and loaded. Now we just need to find him."

"Well, where else would he go? I don't think he would go back to the sewers, or at least that one," Kitty said.

"He might go back to his house, he has Connors's memories. Or he might try to find a lab somewhere and cook up some new way to make a lizard army. Or he might disappear for a while and lick his wounds, I really don't know."

"Looks like I'm on recon duty," MJ said. She took a portable radio off the table, planting a headphone bud in her ear as she turned on a beat up television in the corner. She sat in an old armchair and began slowly flipping through the network channels as well as a few of the cable news networks.

"Recon?" Kitty asked her.

"Yeah," MJ answered over her shoulder. "You'd be surprised how fast the local news interrupts when some crazy goes on a rampage. Though usually if it's a known villain they just flash one of those tickers down on the bottom. You know, 'Stay away from Wall Street, Rhino smashing cars, yadda yadda yadda.'"

"That can't be good for us mutants to have these nuts running around like that," Bobby said. He and Kitty shared a dower look.

"Most of the time some pro-mutant scientist will let everyone know who wasn't a mutant, but I don't imagine people care too much," Peter said from the doorway. They hadn't noticed him slip off, and now he walked back into the room with a clean costume on, his mask held loosely in his hand. "How long do you two plan on waiting for Lizard to show? I can't imagine it will be much longer before you're supposed to be back in Bayville."

"Yeah, you're right, we'll probably have to call soon for a ride."

"Aww, poor Bobby," Kitty said with a pat on his head. "We'll have another adventure some other time. Don't forget, Doctor Octopus made you a sworn enemy."

"Got him!" MJ yelled out, pointing at the TV screen. Sure enough, there was footage of the Lizard shot from a news team on the roof of a low building. He was ducking behind cars as a line of police fired at him. They watched as he began flinging chunks of concrete and brick that littered the street.

"Where is he?" Peter asked.

"Scene of the crime, he went back to ESU."

"I can't web us all there."

"I can get us there fast," Bobby said, "but there'll be an ice trail right to your front door."

"Too much traffic for the van," MJ said.

"Great, so we can stop this fight but we can't get there," said Kitty.

"Look, let's just get far enough away from here, and then I can ice us there."

"I'll get the van, and I'll drop you off by the bridge," MJ said, running out up the basement stairs before anyone could say anything.

Laying his mask on the table, Peter snapped his web launchers into place and carefully attached several webs to the Recombinator, slinging it across his back once more. "We should try and make this as quick as possible, but I don't want the police to get their hands of Doc Connors. So let's try and lure him far enough away for us to change him back where people can't see. Then we can sneak him away."

"You think it's smart to just let him go like that?" Kitty asked.

"I'll go see him tomorrow and make sure everything's okay. The Lizard is like his Mr. Hyde, he probably won't even remember any of this."

"You're call," she said with a frown.

"She's back," Bobby called from the top of the stairs where he had been keeping watch. "Coast is clear."

The three teens made a dash for the open van door, slamming the door shut as MJ raced the car down the street. Kitty and Peter felt relieved there were few cars on the street at the moment in the neighborhood, since MJ was driving a few notches above reckless, but Bobby was soaking it up as he moved into the passenger seat to enjoy the ride.

They pulled to a stop at the base of the Queensboro Bridge and piled out. Peter stayed for a moment to give Mary Jane a smile. "Thanks MJ, I owe you another one."

"Just get him, Tiger," she said with a smile of her own. He pulled on his mask, jumped out of the van and closed the door behind him. Once again the redhead sped off.

Bobby ran his eyes along the length of the bridge as MJ drove away. Rubbing his hands together in anticipation, he mapped out his path. Cracking his knuckles, he closed his eyes and centered himself. The distance combined with the speed would make this a difficult run to begin with, but the way he planned to attach to the bridge would make it worse. He needed to remain as focused as possible on this first leg of the journey. "Ready?" he asked.

"Let's do it," Kitty said, wrapping her hands around Bobby's. "Grab on," she waved an elbow at Peter. He linked his own arm through hers, and he felt just the slightest hint of his spider-sense as the trio was lifted off the ground by a slide of ice forming below them.

With his free hand outstretched, Bobby froze the moisture in the air around him, with the ice forming behind him to push their section forward while making support structures in front of them. The supports first reached down to the ground, and then he made them connecting to the side of the bridge to the left of them. This was the hardest part, as he had to make extra support for the bridge since it wouldn't be held up by pillars underneath them. Once their path was parallel to the bridge Bobby picked up the speed, dropping the temperature in front of them faster and sending them hurtling across the East River, Roosevelt Island, and back across the water. They reached the other side and began plowing across rooftops and twisted down the streets with the occasional direction from Peter.

As they soared across Central Park, Kitty turned back to Spidey. "You shouldn't have dumped her!" she said over the wind.

"Do we need to talk about this now?" he said, his body shaking slightly. While he had no problem with heights and regularly performed flips in the air as he freefell from the top of skyscrapers, being shot through the city at these speeds of a block of ice outside of his control was making him a little nervous. Kitty on the other hand seemed to be taking it in stride, and he knew the Iceman was grinning.

"I'm just saying, you're crazy for each other and she's never going to be out of danger, so why use that as an excuse?"

"Again, let's talk about this later."

They began to slow down and at last Bobby deposited them on the roof of the very building they had first sat on together earlier that day. Peering over the edge they could see the Lizard was still throwing pieces of the destroyed museum at the police, who had given up shooting at the monster and were waiting for backup. Down at the end of the street they could see a SWAT truck forced to stop due to the heavy traffic on the damaged street. The teams were swarming out, grabbing gear and preparing to move down the rows of abandoned cars.

"They're going to shred him apart if they get to him," Bobby said.

"Or gas him and lock him up somewhere," Kitty added.

Peter checked the webbing on the Recombinator and gave one last glance over the side. "All right, I'm going to get his attention and then we'll try to lead him back to the park. It's open enough for a fight and we can use the trees for cover when we get him human again. You guys get ready in case he decides I'm not interesting enough to follow." Seeing the other two's nods, he crawled over the edge, scurrying down the front of the building until he was a few stories from the ground. "Hey Scalehead! Did anyone ever tell you that tail makes you look fat?"

Spider-sense flaring, he did a back flip up the side of the building, avoiding the thrown shard of windshield that smashed into the wall where his head had been at the same time the roar of "Spider!" reached his ears.

"First off, it's Spider-Man. With a hyphen. If I wanted to be just Spider, or just Man I suppose, I would have said that. Second, never mind, you're already after me!"

The Lizard locked his eyes on the Recombinator on Spidey's back, his yellow eyes contracting in anger. He let out a guttural hiss, his scaled lips curling back to reveal the rows of razor sharp teeth, as he leapt over the cars strewn about the street. He vaulted off a small sedan, jabbing his clawed fingers into the front façade of the building and scaling his way to the costumed hero. Spidey quickly snapped a webline to the top of the wall, using the elasticity of the webbing to vault himself back to the roof.

"Go!" he waved to Kitty and Bobby.

Iceman didn't wait. With Kitty hanging onto his arm he jumped forward back onto the ice bridge he had already created, his powers adding another layer to the frozen structure to keep them moving forward without the need to make new supports, just reinforce the old ones. To his right he could see the sun beginning to set on the horizon, and he couldn't help but think this could have been a wonderfully romantic way to end his date today, if he didn't have a four hundred pound lizard chasing after them.

Spidey had sprinted to the far end of the roof and threw himself into a swan dive. He fired a web from his right hand at the farthest point of his arch, snagging the edge of a nearby building and swinging himself forward. He sent a second line with his left hand as the Lizard leapt from the rooftop. His gait was awkward to look at, as sometimes he ran on all fours and sometimes just the back two. But despite looks, the monster was fast. Bobby saw this and realized the Lizard was still following Spider-Man, or more likely, the Neogenic device strapped to his back.

Bobby leaned to his left, forming an offshoot to the original slide. He took this new path and double backed towards the Lizard. "Grab onto my waist, I need my hand," Bobby called back to Kitty.

"What do you think you're doing?" she yelled into his ear as she wrapped both of her arms around her waste.

Bobby ignored her. His left hand still focusing his power on the slide, he shot them around the Lizard, blasting him in the face with rain of ice shards before spinning back towards the original slide.

"Great," Kitty said looking behind him, "he's following us now."

"Good, we're faster than Pete."

"Didn't know you cared." He could hear the half smile in her voice. He ignored that too.

Just on the edges of his peripheral vision he could see the Lizard sprinting along the roof tops to their left. Bobby was suddenly caught off guard as the green man jumped from over fifteen feet away directly at them. Bobby stopped the flow of ice through the bridge just as Kitty phased the two of them. The Lizard passed right in front of them, his talons swiping through Bobby's intangible head. He landed on the opposite roof on all fours, his body whipping around as he prepared for another leap. Kitty unphased them as Bobby hit the proverbial gas with his powers, pushing them back onto the original slide and rocketing them towards Central Park.

The Lizard was quick to follow, springing onto the ice left in their wake. He slipped once, but regained his balance by digging his claws into the bridge. Using his claws, he rushed after the mutants.

"He's gaining on us, I can't believe how fast he's moving," Kitty said. She turned back to Bobby. "Can you get us moving faster?"

"Much more than this and I don't know if I'll be able to reinforce the supports in time," he answered. Sweat had rolled down his brow and frozen as he concentrated. He shook his head, knocking a few loose.

"How far away can you set the push point?" Kitty asked. She knew she couldn't just phase them to stop Lizard's attacks, because Bobby wouldn't be able to generate tangible ice to propel them with.

"Six, seven feet maybe? Not a lot and we're going to lose speed because of it."

"That's fine, he'll be on top of us in a second anyways. Just tell me when we're over the park."

Kitty let go of Bobby and walked carefully a few feet away from him. She could see the line in the ice where the new pieces of the slide were created. It would have been fascinating to study sometime, but not now. The Lizard was thrashing down the slide towards her on all fours, each claw ripping out chips of ice so fast that they made it look like he was riding a cloud of ice particles. She didn't have much time to think of a plan to stop him from reaching Bobby while keeping him in the chase.

Her thinking time was cut back to nothing as the Lizard pounced, clearing the last bit of distance between them. Stepping back to allow him to at least get footing on the moving block, she phased through his snapping jaws and reaching hands, countering with a quick chop to the throat from underneath while she threw her leg between his and delivered a hooking axe kick to the back of his left knee, forcing him to drop forward. She closed the gap and dropped her left elbow down onto the back of his lowered head.

The Lizard managed to grab the moving ice with one hand to keep him from accidentally falling as Kitty's blows forced his momentum to continue forward. He stopped himself from face planting and with a shove he thrust his shoulder into Kitty's stomach. Having learned her lesson from many private sparring sessions with the metal-boned Wolverine, she let her body relax and shift slightly to avoid getting the wind knocked out of her. Even without that injury, she was still knocked badly off balance, her feet slipping out from under her as she fell backwards. Seeing his opening, he prepared to pounce on her again when she disappeared through the ice.

Seeing her gone, he moved to take his shot at the one who had sprayed the sharp ice at him when he was hit in his own stomach by Kitty. She had phased through most of the slide, letting her hands grip the top as she swung like a gymnast, planting both her feet into his exposed abdomen. She let herself follow through enough to lift him just slightly off his feet before letting her feet rephase and pass through him. They both fell down onto the ice, the Lizard laid out winded on his front while Kitty let herself phase back through and pulled herself back up with her hands and power.

Kitty let herself breathe for a moment, letting the Lizard's weak attempt to grab her leg phase through her. She braced herself, as it didn't take long for him to shake his head, give one last wheezing breath and then begin to stand. Luckily for her, Bobby had begun to angle their travel downwards as he called out, "We're here!"

"Finally!" Kitty said. She phased through the next attack from the Lizard, letting her body slip down through the ice, the frozen block continuing carrying on without her. She passed through the leg of the Lizard, and at the last moment grabbed the end of his tail, phasing him and dragging him down with her. It was a twenty foot drop from the height Bobby had moved the slide to. Kitty let go of the tail, rephasing the Lizard and slamming him into the ground as Kitty made a graceful dive into the grassy clearing. She arched her back after she submerged, slowing her momentum and bringing her body's path back towards the surface like she might have if she jumped into a pool from a high dive. She reemerged about ten feet from where she had entered the ground, just in time to see Peter in a kneeling crouch nearby, the Neogenic Recombinator held against his shoulder like a rifle.

"Sorry if this hurts Doc, hope you don't puke up anything important," Spidey said as he pushed the activation button.

Kitty watched in dismay as the Lizard scrambled out of the way of the blue beam that shot from the cannon. Peter tried to follow him, the beam cutting a swath in the ground where he once stood, sending dirt flying into the air. But the Lizard ducked behind a large protrusion of rocks, and when the ray hit the stone the device gave a high pitched whir and shut off.

"It's at times like this that I hate science," Spider-Man said, his spider-sense buzzing madly as Kitty dove towards him. Too scared that phasing might further damage the already fragile Recombinator, she settled for tackling the masked man as the Lizard launched himself from the rock outcropping. They rolled on the ground, sending the Recombinator spinning away from them, landing with a small bounce on the spongy grass out of their reach.

The Lizard rolled himself when he missed the teens, tucking into a somersault and popping back up on his feet. He snarled at Kitty and Peter, ready to strike again when he saw the Recombinator out of the corner of his eyes. He gave a gurgling, hissing laugh. "I told you it would be mine again!" he said, sprinting towards it.

"I don't think so!" rang out two voices. Spidey shot two weblines from underneath Kitty, each connecting with one of the Lizard's ankles and pulled, sending him back down on the ground while Iceman, in full ice form, sped by on a slide, snagging the Recombinator by the still attached web strap that Peter had made earlier.

With a swipe of his claws the Lizard sliced through the webs. He climbed back to his feet, his eyes tracking Bobby a moment before he brought his fists slamming down onto the ice trail. It shattered under the impact, cracking the latest segment Bobby had created and flipping the frozen mutant into the air. He flew upside down towards the rocks, but managed to toss the device over to Kitty and Peter before his back slammed into the boulders.

Kitty picked the Recombinator out of the air, fumbling it a bit but saving it from hitting the ground. Peter had stood and was firing his webs into the Lizard's eyes as the beast began to charge towards Kitty. "We've probably got one shot left, so make it good!" he yelled to her as he flipped over the villain. Spidey grabbed the Lizard's scaled arm, wrangling it into an elbow lock behind his back and pinning it in place with webbing. He made for the other arm but the Lizard lifted his long tail, forcing Peter to leap away. The animal ripped his hand free, charging to where he had last seen Kitty as he struggled with the webbing on his eyes when was stopped again, this time by a battering ram of ice slamming into his shoulder. Bobby swung the long pole of ice, this time hitting the Lizard across the chest, sprawling him out and breaking the ice.

"Now Kitty!" Bobby said as the Lizard struggled to his feet.

She held her breath, dropping to one knee as Peter had done earlier, steadied the device as much as she could and fired.

Unable to see where the beam was coming from and dodge it, the Lizard was hit directly in the chest, throwing him backwards to the ground. The beam continued for a moment into thin air before it shorted out. The Recombinator's high pitched sound died, the various readout screens blinking off. She dumped the dead metal onto the ground and joined Bobby and Peter. They watched in silence as Doctor Connors's body rapidly changed back into its human form.

"Nice shot 'cat," Bobby said at last, kissing the top of her head. She smiled and wrapped her arm around his waist. "And nice moves Spider-Man."

"Not too bad yourself Iceman," Peter said. He gave one final look at the unconscious Connors before glancing around. "No cops yet, but I'm not sure if we should move him; we might want to wait a bit."

"My ice will lead them right here eventually. Hopefully the little detour I took after Kitty got him to the ground will lead them away long enough."

"Maybe we can take the lab coat off and say it was some guy we found who was attacked," Kitty suggested.

Their debate was cut short by the sound of a rapidly approaching helicopter. They stared at each other, not sure what to do. While the thin tree line around the clearing offered them some cover, the gleaming white and blue ice slides all over the area all led right to that spot.

"What if Kitty phased him into the ground? That might hide him from the cops for now," Peter said with a nervous shrug.

"I don't think that would help," Bobby said, peeking through the trees at the helicopter. "It's worse than the cops."

"How can it possibly be worse?"

Bobby turned back to Kitty, his lips pursed tight. "It's one of ours."

And sure enough, over his shoulder, she could see the Velocity landing.

**A/N: It's the story that just won't end! I swear, one last Epilogue like chapter to go. Not that any of you mind that there's more.**


	6. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

They waited in dread as the sleek black copter settled on the ground, the blades of its rotor slowly winding to a stop. They could see movement through the tinted cockpit glass, but not faces. "I hope it's Beast," Bobby said in a loud whisper to Kitty. "I can handle Beast."

"Or Ororo," she replied. "Just anyone but..."

The side hatch of the Velocity slid open with a snap-hiss, a black ramp lowering to the grass below as a pair of heavy booted feet stomped their way down.

"Logan?" Peter said in slight surprise at the sight of the stocky fighter striding down the ramp.

"How do you know Logan?" Bobby asked incredulously.

"Met him a few times," Peter said, his expression impossible to read through the mask. His head tilted to the other two mutants, still receiving their disbelieving looks.

"You never said anything about that!" Kitty said.

"What, it never came up."

Logan reached the trio, his hard black eyes sweeping slowly across them before settling on the large white eyes of Peter's mask. He looked up at the brightly colored teen, jabbing a finger into his chest. "I should have known you would be involved in this mess."

"Great, they run off and play heroes and I'm the one getting in trouble?" he said, hands defensively in the air.

"Don't get me wrong, they're in plenty of trouble themselves," he gave them a sideways glance, "but that doesn't mean you're off the hook."

"Logan, leave him alone," Kitty said, crossing her arms and glaring at their instructor. "We got involved long before he showed up. And we were the ones who decided to keep helping to stop the Lizard."

"Lizard huh?" he saw Doctor Connors still out cold on the ground. "That the guy who shoots acid from his tail?"

"No, that's the Scorpion," Peter answered. "Lizard is a giant crocodile lizard thing."

Logan gave one sharp laugh. "Right. You're villains are pretty lame kid."

"How did you find us anyways?" Bobby asked.

"Aside from watching the news and following the giant blocks of ice you've left all over the city?" Logan snarled.

"Um, yeah," Bobby drawled.

"Your constant power use was quite easy to detect with Cerebro," came a voice from behind Logan. They had all been so overwhelmed by the presence of Logan that they hadn't noticed Professor Xavier moving towards them. He stopped next to Logan, but began speaking to Spidey instead of his students. "Hello Peter, I'm Professor Charles Xavier. I have no doubt these two have mentioned me to you."

Peter tentatively shook the hand Xavier offered him. "How do you know who I am?"

"I am a telepath, and while using my powers to pinpoint the location of Kitty and Bobby I gleaned your identity from their minds. I apologize for that, as I am sure you have strived to keep it a secret from as many as possible. I assure you that we will guard it as best as we can."

"Thanks, I appreciate that."

Xavier shifted his attention back to the other two. His voice remained calm, but they could sense his disappointment and mild anger. "And now I believe it is time for an explanation. I allowed you to come into the city trusting that you would maintain a low profile and refrain from using your powers. I think it is safe to say you've done anything but."

"Not to put a damper on the punishment," Spidey interrupted, "but I'd really like to get Doc Connors somewhere safe before the cops show up. He's not responsible for what the Lizard does and his research is too important to let them just lock him up."

"He's quite safe right now. I've created a psychic barrier around the area. It will deter anyone from wandering this way. Now, about today's events."

And so Kitty and Bobby took turns explaining everything they had done that day, starting from the sightseeing they had done, to the point where they found themselves in the middle of a theft by Doctor Octopus and the Lizard. They told how they had met up with Spider-Man and when the Lizard escaped how they decided to help out. They went on about their time in the sewers, their fight in Hell's Kitchen, and the blast that prevented Bobby from changing out of his ice form.

"Peter was a big help at saving Bobby. Who knows what could have happened if he couldn't figure out how to work the Recombinator in time," Kitty said. The panic in her voice was evident, as the idea of what might have happened had never slipped far from her mind that afternoon.

"He helped us, only fair that we kept helping him make sure his friend was turned back to normal," Bobby added.

"We had to get Doctor Connors away from the police so they wouldn't arrest him, and that led to all the ice," she said lamely.

Xavier was quiet for some time, his face lost in concentration. Logan had an almost proud look on his face, usually an expression, described often as one tiny notch above stoic, he reserved for when they managed to break some sort of record in the Danger Room. It was usually followed by yells to do it again, so Kitty and Bobby weren't sure what to expect.

Finally the Professor began to speak again. "It is still a dangerous time for mutants and there is much uncertainty as to how our relations with the general populous will play out. I can only hope today's events will not be used as more ammunition for those who fear us. But I will admit to being torn about this, because you have shown courage and strong moral character today with your actions. You were not showboating or using your powers irresponsibly, but looking out for the safety of others, including those who were the unwitting cause of the trouble. For that, I am proud that you are X-Men. And I'm sure Logan would praise you for your tactics, if he was inclined to give such complements. For those reasons, I believe a mild punishment is all that is required." He looked to Logan for this.

Logan gave a nod in agreement. "Most of the vehicles are pretty dirty and could do with a nice wash and wax. I think you have some experience in that," Logan said to Bobby.

"Yeah, yeah, I know," Bobby said kicking the ground, well aware of the number of times he had received the punishment. At least Kitty would be there to keep him company this time.

"So, now what?" Spidey said. He had been perched on the side of a tree for most of the tale, adding a few details here and there but mostly remaining silent.

"Now I believe we can assist you in getting Doctor Connors back to his home, and you to yours," Xavier said. "I want to thank you for all that you have done to help Bobby, Peter. I know that you are not a mutant, and most likely will never accept it, but there is always an offer for you to join us at the Institute if you'd like."

"Thanks Professor, but you're right. I have a life here, it would be too hard for me to just up and move like that now. Maybe when I first got my powers, but I'm doing all right now."

"I understand. Just know if you ever need any sort of assistance, don't hesitate to call."

They loaded the Doctor onto the helicopter and piled in. Peter was instantly intrigued by every aspect of the helicopter, mercilessly flinging questions at Logan about the design.

"Forgotten how much you talk, kid; reminds me of the Half-Pint here."

"Hey!" Kitty and Peter shouted together, sharing a laugh.

They were able to get Doctor Connors safely back into his house, Xavier ensuring that anyone who noticed them would not remember they were there. Peter left the doctor a note, explaining what had happened and that he, as Spider-Man, would be checking in on him in the morning to see how he was. They also left the Neogenic Recombinator with him, the device too damaged to work but most likely repairable by those at Connors's lab at ESU.

Lastly they flew back to Queens to drop Peter off. Landing Velocity in a nearby park, Xavier allowed Bobby and Kitty some time to say goodbye to their new friend as they walked back to his house to pick up Kitty's purse. Peter had been given an Xavier t-shirt and workout pants that had been among the spare uniforms kept on the helicopter, allowing him to walk freely down the streets of his neighborhood without be ousted as Spider-Man. Bobby sported a new shirt as well, replacing the tattered remains of his other shirt, which had barely hung on his body after all the slashes, throws and genetic deconstruction beams that he had suffered that day.

"Look, I ran into him once in the city and he helped me out of a jam, and then I helped him another time when he was on the run from some guys. This was all right before everyone found out about mutants," Peter said. "Besides, you never mentioned his name was Logan, you kept calling him Wolverine."

The point was dropped as they came in site of the Parker's home. Sitting on a porch swing was Mary Jane, who rushed over to them with a grin when she saw them. "So how did it go? The news said the Lizard just took off and they don't know where he went."

"It's good, we got him back home, all humanified and everything," Peter said. "Only real problem was that Kitty and Bobby's Professor showed up afterwards. Apparently they're not supposed to be out superheroing this trip. Tsk tsk tsk."

MJ laughed. "Shame on both of you!" She handed Kitty her tiny backpack. "So I guess this means you guys are leaving?"

"Yeah, and we're only a little grounded when we get back," Bobby said with a smirk. "Not too bad for a day full of trouble."

"Too bad you can't stick around, it's been a lot of fun. It's nice having other people to talk to besides Peter."

"You have way more friends than I do MJ, I don't know what you're complaining about," Peter said.

"But I can't talk to them about you running off and fighting the latest creep in a Halloween costume to blow something up."

"Don't worry," Kitty jumped it. "We'll keep in touch. We're not that far away and maybe we'll be allowed to come back down sometime, you know, when we turn eighteen or something."

"Or you could always come visit us," Bobby suggested. "We don't have a lot of friends outside the mansion these days."

"I wouldn't mind getting a crack at the Danger Room," Peter said as his eyes took on a far away look.

MJ rolled her eyes. "Anyways, here's our email addresses and phone numbers, don't be strangers." She handed Kitty a slip of paper with all the information.

"Don't worry, we won't," Kitty said. She gave the redhead a hug, whispering something in her ear as Bobby and Peter awkwardly looked around.

"We don't, hug, do we?" Peter asked.

"No, pretty sure we're not allowed to."

"All right, just checking."

The girls laughed, though the guys couldn't tell if it was at them or whatever Kitty had said to MJ. Kitty then went on to hug Peter goodbye as MJ wrapped her arms around Bobby. She held the embrace for a moment before pulling her head back to look him in the eye. "Make sure you keep in touch, I'll need someone normal to talk to after Peter goes on about his latest science project."

Bobby just laughed. "I will, I promise. I kinda know what it's like."

MJ gave him a peck on the cheek and broke the hug. Kitty was finishing whispering something in Peter's ear, no doubt last minute advice regarding Mary Jane. The four stood around for a moment longer, not sure what to say or do, when Bobby just shook his head with a chuckle. "We'll see you guys later, have a good night."

Each couple waved to the other as they turned and headed in opposite directions, Peter and MJ back to the house, Bobby and Kitty back to the park and their ride home.

"This was a lot of fun," Kitty said.

"So good date?"

"Certainly wasn't what I expected, but it was exciting. And we met new people, that's always a good thing."

"Yeah, it is."

"I would have liked it if you had been a little friendlier with Peter though."

"I don't know. I don't hate the guy or anything, but something about him still irks me."

"What, that's he's a man and he's talking to me?"

"Sounds about right."

"Oh please," she stopped. "I bet if you just gave it a little time you and Peter would be amazing friends."

"Yeah, right, and Wolverine talks in an Australian accent," he rolled his eyes.

"Okay, but don't be surprised when I start rubbing it in your face when you two become all BFF."

"If it happens, go right ahead."

"Oh I will." An evil grin crossed her face as she began walking again. "So MJ was all over you there a minute ago."

"Like you weren't all over Peter?"

"I'm just saying, you seemed to look at her a lot when we were with her. Checking out another woman Bobby?"

"She's cute Kitty, but you're cuter."

"Damn right I am." The grin hadn't left her face, making Bobby nervous. "She looks a lot like Jean, did you notice that? Does that mean you're checking out Jean too? Wonder what Scott would say."

He grabbed her hand and pulled her into a hug, kissing her forehead. "You enjoy driving me crazy, don't you?"

She pushed herself up onto the balls of her feet and kissed his nose. "Yes."

He let out a small laugh, took hold of her hand and began to walk back to the park. they went together, hand in hand, teasing each other about the day and thinking about what misadventures they might have on their next official date.

The End

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**A/N: There you have it folks, the end for now. I don't know when I'll start writing it, but I'm already planning out Misadventures II, called Double Date. In the mean time, take a gander at my other stories, and be sure to read any of the others I may put up.**


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